


The Providence of Sparrows

by akamarykate



Category: Early Edition
Genre: Gary Hobson: A Man Born to Have Kids, Gen, Season 3 can suck it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-20
Updated: 2016-09-20
Packaged: 2018-08-16 03:44:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 49,879
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8085718
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/akamarykate/pseuds/akamarykate
Summary: Providence:  Foresight, prevision, esp. anticipation of and preparation for the future; the foreknowing and beneficent care and government of God or of nature; divine direction, control, or guidance; a person who acts or appears in the character of Providence  (Oxford English Dictionary)





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally written and posted at the GTA Early Edition Archive in early May, 2000. I'd been working on the story for a few months when we got wind of the summary for the S4 episode "Time," and given a similar plot point, I rushed to finish it and get it out there before the episode aired. 
> 
> So, yeah, that was 16 years ago, and some of the elements of this might reflect that. For the most part, I'm going to sit on my hands and let it stand as is (but wow, I never met an em-dash or an ellipsis I didn't like!). 
> 
> The story is set mid-season 4. There are a few characters who were inspired by, and in a couple cases named after, characters from other media. See the notes at the end of the story for those acknowledgements.
> 
> Thanks:  
> ...to GTA members Earlydues, inkling, and Maryilee, for an unforgettable trip to Chicago that included Ferris wheel scoping;  
> ...to Ann H., whose post about what she saw of the filming of "Time" led directly to the panic-stricken inspiration that got this puppy finished;  
> ...to inkling (again) for the beta;  
> ...and to Jayne L., who has always championed this story and who gave me the kick in the butt to post it here.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~* 

_Not a whit; we defy augury. There is a special providence in the fall of a sparrow._  
~ Hamlet, V:ii

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~* 

"Mrs. Miller! Mrs. Miller, wait up!" Gary was running as fast as his legs would carry him, but the elderly woman had a two-block head start. "Hey! Mrs. Miller!"

She must have been hard of hearing. The streets were nearly deserted, but she didn't turn her curly grey head to look back over her shoulder, and kept up a brisk pace despite the two sacks of groceries she carried. Gary pistoned his legs into quicker motion. He nearly tripped over a rake that lay in the middle of the sidewalk, but an awkward hop-skip kept him from going down.

"Mrs. Miller!" he gasped when he was just a few feet behind her, and finally, she heard.

"What in the world?" she asked, shifting her load and lifting her sunglasses to peer closely at Gary as he bent over, hands on his knees, trying to catch his breath. After a moment, he was able to hand her a small white paper sack.

"This--this fell out of your stuff, back by the mailbox," Gary panted. He finally straightened up. Reaching for the proffered item, Mrs. Miller smiled indulgently at Gary. She wore blue jogging pants and a "Spirit of 1776" T-shirt. Her eyes widened when she got a close look at the sack.

"Oh, my heavens! This is George's prescription. Thank goodness you found it!"

Running a hand through his hair and down to the back of his neck, where sweat was dripping uncomfortably behind his shirt collar, Gary nodded. "It looked important." He wiped his hand on his jeans, and the sweat transferred black newspaper-ink stains from his skin to his new jeans. Drat.

"It is. It's his heart medicine, and the old bottle was all used up. If he'd had any problems today and we hadn't been able to find it--oh, dear, I don't want to think what would have happened."

Gary didn't quite know how to respond to that, but he didn't have to. A screen door slammed across the street and a familiar voice called, "Gary Hobson! Come home right this instant! You still haven't finished your homework!"

"Aw, Mom--" It was the first truly warm day they'd had all spring, after weeks and weeks of rain, and the thought of going inside to wrestle with fractions and decimals was too dreadful to be borne.

"Let me take care this," Mrs. Miller said with a conspiratorial wink. She handed one of the grocery sacks to Gary and they crossed the tree-lined street together, without looking either way. It was Hickory, Indiana, after all--no one checked before jaywalking. If a car came, it would stop for them.

"Good afternoon, Lois. How are you, dear?"

Gary and Mrs. Miller stopped where the walkway to his home joined the sidewalk. His mother stood on the front porch step, arms akimbo.

"I'm just fine, Elaine. It's a lovely day, isn't it?" Her tone dropped to a lower, more ominous register. "Gary, your math." She gestured at the screen door, behind which lay the dining room table, and a jumble of numbers and symbols waiting to be lined up in neat columns and added together. Gary sighed, but Mrs. Miller put a hand on his arm before he could obey his mother.

"Now, now, Lois, the boy was just helping me carry my groceries home, weren't you, Gary?"

He nodded quickly, and a shock of dark brown hair flopped in his face. Transferring the grocery sack to his left arm, Gary pushed the wayward strands out of his eyes, before his mom could get after him about needing a haircut, too.

"Well..." She was starting to cave. "I suppose a few minutes couldn't hurt."

Gary widened his eyes in his best innocent look and bit back a grin. Even if it was only carrying a sack of groceries the two blocks to the Millers' house, the reprieve was entirely welcome. "Here, Mrs. Miller, let me take the other sack, too."

"You have quite a helpful son, Lois," Elaine Miller called with a warm smile as she handed the second bag to Gary. "I'm sure he's going to grow up to be a wonderful young man. He'll do great things someday, mark my words."

"He won't do anything unless he gets through the sixth grade," Gary's mother said dryly. "He was only supposed to run the old newspapers over to the recycling station. But I'm glad he can help you out. Gary, you come right home, do you hear me?"

"Yes, ma'am," he said earnestly.

Mrs. Miller waited until they were a few houses away from Gary's before she told him, with another broad wink, "I think math homework can wait an extra minute or two. I have cookies cooling on the kitchen table."

This time, Gary's "Yes, ma'am" was quite a bit more enthusiastic.

"I meant what I told your mother, Gary," said Mrs. Miller as they climbed the worn cement steps to her shingle-sided bungalow. "I see great things in your future."

So did Gary, actually. For starters, he wanted to live in a city where he would have to look both ways before crossing the street. But he wasn't sure if that was what she was getting at, so he simply nodded.

"You're a good boy," she told him, patting his shoulder as he juggled the bags to hold the front door open for her. "With that heart of yours, I just know you're going to do things that will make us all proud."

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ 

Ignoring the sign that read, "Delivery Trucks Only", Gary steered his jeep onto Navy Pier and gunned the engine, desperate to reach his destination on time. In the bleak, freezing dark, there was no one around to stop him.

He didn't need signs to tell him where to go; the Ferris wheel loomed over the pier like the skeleton of a full moon, its white metalwork glowing against the indigo sky. Slamming on the brake when he reached the stairs to the ride, Gary nearly forgot to put the car in park before leaping out and sprinting toward the stairs.

A young boy, the article had said, but it had given no name. The pier's shops and restaurants had long since closed for the evening, and there wasn't another human being in sight, let alone a kid. Taking the treacherous, icy steps three at a time, Gary emerged on the upper deck of the pier out of breath and frantic.

No signs of life up here, either, but there was someone, there had to be. Gary hurried over to the Ferris wheel, hurdling the low white fence that surrounded it in one easy leap. The wheel rotated slowly, as it often did even in off hours, just for show. Its red cars swung back and forth in the stiff January wind.

"Hey!" Gary called, cupping his hands around his mouth and directing his voice upward. "Hey, kid, are you there? C'mon, I know you're here somewhere!"

There was no response, only the metallic creak of the cars and the distant slap of waves against the pier.

Yanking the paper out of his back pocket, fumbling with the thin pages through his leather gloves, he located the article.

_Unidentified Boy Falls From Navy Pier Ride_

"Late last night, security personnel at Chicago's Navy Pier discovered the body of a young boy near the pier's famous Ferris wheel. Police are still searching for the family of the child, who was described as somewhere between the ages of four and six, and probably of Hispanic descent. The Medical Examiner's report indicates that the child must have fallen from one of the cars or the structure of the ride, although how he could have climbed to such a height is unknown."

That part wasn't hard to figure out. If they kept the Ferris Wheel turning like this all night, the boy could have climbed into one of the cars when it was still close to the ground, and then been carried up high enough to...Gary shook himself, not wanting to think about how badly the boy's body must have been broken for the ME to judge that the height of the fall had been at least thirty feet.

The real questions were, where had the security personnel been when the boy had snuck onto the ride, and why was no one out looking for him--parents, family, anyone? Since no one had come forward to identify the child, there was no name, which was what Gary really needed. The wind gusted harder, trying to tug the paper from his hand. Long fingers of cold air played with his hair, raising goosebumps on his skull.

"Kid! Hey kid! I know you're up there!" Gary hoped his shouts would attract attention and possibly help, but right now the pier was deserted. Smashing the paper into a careless roll, he forced it into the inside pocket of his parka.

The wind picked up even more, and the cars swung crazily back and forth. "C'mon, kid, where are you?" The weather report had predicted a couple inches of snow, temperatures in the single digits, and wind chills dropping well below zero. Up here, he could believe it. Almost hoarse now, Gary decided to try another tactic. He hurried to the control booth that operated the ride. It was, of course, locked. Although he could have easily smashed the glass and reached inside, the control panel itself had locks that needed keys, and he had no idea how to hot-wire it, so that idea was out.

Stepping away from the Ferris wheel so that he could look all the way up, Gary scanned the huge circle for some sign of a child or an open car. He was about to run and look for security personnel when he heard a sound under the creaking and moaning of the metal bars. It was a whimper, small and scared, but definitely human. He hurried around to the other side of the Ferris wheel and finally located the car with the open door. If the wheel had been a clock, the car would have been situated at two, it was that far up. A dark splotch stood out against the red metal cage, but Gary couldn't make out any features.

"Hey, get back in the car! Wait until it comes down here, to the ground!" He was shouting with all his might over the wind that carried his voice out to the lake, but there was no response other than the boy's whimper, rising to a keening cry, more hair-raisingly eerie than the gale.

"Kid, c'mon, get back in the car!" Gary waved his arms in a pushing motion to illustrate his point. Still no movement. Then, to his surprise, his voice was joined by another. Higher-pitched and frightened, it carried over the sound of the approaching storm.

"Nardo! Bernardo, what are you doing up there? I told you to stay on the bench!" Gary turned to see a young girl, all skinny legs and long black hair whipping in the wind, gloveless hands cupped around her mouth as she shouted to the child above them.

"You know that boy?" Gary asked, but even though she wasn't looking at him, the girl seemed to sense his step toward her, and she moved away the exact same distance, never taking her eyes off the car.

She took a deep breath and shouted again, this time a stream of Spanish that left Gary's long-ago high school class in the dust, punctuated at the end with English. "You heard me, get down from there now!"

"No!" Gary shouted. "No, you can't tell him that! Tell him to get back in the car until it gets closer to the ground." He covered the distance between himself and the girl in three long strides. Transfixed, she watched him with huge, dark eyes. Her worn canvas coat, far too thin for a night like this, billowed about her in the wind. "It's okay," he told her, lowering his voice. "I want to help."

"He's my brother. He--he's still learning English." Her eyes, desperate and confused, darted from Gary to the ride.

"Then can ya tell him in Spanish? Tell him to sit down." Gary turned back to the Ferris wheel, where the car titled dangerously back and forth. "Sit _down_!" he yelled again, not knowing if he would be understood by the other child, but hoping the girl would get it.

"Bernardo, Siéntese abajo!" Her call was cut short by a scream. Gary whirled to see short legs dangling out the door of the car, which was only marginally lower, just past three o'clock. "Nardo!"

"Tell him to hold on!" Another barrage of Spanish, commands that all ended, or maybe began, with "Bernardo", was directed at the tiny child. His keening cry was louder now; the car was coming around, around, moving excruciatingly slowly toward the ground, long seconds passing like molasses. Gary moved under the car, trying to gauge where Bernardo would land if he fell, a task made all the more difficult as the car swung under the combined forces of the wind and the boy's weight. He wished he would have paid more attention in physics as well as Spanish. He also wished he would have brought a net, and a few firefighters for good measure.

When it happened, Gary didn't have time to think about angles and impact. He was trying to get as directly under the car as he could, getting dizzier by the second from watching Bernardo cling to the door as it swung open and shut, open and shut--when the little boy turned to look toward his sister's voice.

He moved too quickly, and that, coupled with a strong gust of wind, was too much for the delicate balance of child, car, and gravity. The car tipped to one side, and Bernardo lost his grip, tumbling the remaining twenty feet to the pier in a tangle of dark hair and skinny limbs and denim and sweatshirt and screams, his own and his sister's.

Time, which had been crawling a split second before, now moved too fast for thought. Gary did the only thing he could do; he held out his arms, hearing the admonition of every baseball coach he'd ever had to keep his eye on the ball. The ball had appendages and a siren wail this time, but he did it; managed to catch the boy and take the brunt of the fall himself, grabbing on tight to the solidity of flesh as the child tumbled into his arms and they rolled into a snowbank, dispersing the momentum of the fall.

Forgotten, the Ferris wheel still did its slow turn above them as a sob sounded in Gary's ear. "Hey, it's okay, you're okay," he managed to soothe, when a new set of hands helped untangle man and child.

"Bernardo, you stupid boy," the girl began when her brother was standing before her. Still trying to catch his breath, Gary knelt on the pavement, hands on his knees. She continued in Spanish, and Gary looked up to see the little boy's lower lip quivering as he listened, head down, to the scolding she delivered.

"Hey," he interrupted gently. "Go easy on him, he's scared. He could have died." The girl stared at Gary for a moment, resentment in her dark eyes.

"I could have saved him."

Taken aback, Gary stammered, "Well, uh--yeah, sure, of course you could have, but--" But she wouldn't have. And they wouldn't have found Bernardo's family because she would have run when she failed to catch him.

"I don't know what you thought you were doing, mister." Her lilting accent did nothing to soften her fierce, determined scowl; she clenched her hands into fists at her sides. "I can take care of my brother just fine."

The little boy's quivering lip was moving faster now, and he sucked in great gulps of air. "L-L-L-Lucy?" he finally blubbered. "Y-yo soy arrepentido, Lucy, yo soy tan arrepentido!" Dissolving into sobs, he threw himself at his sister, wrapping his arms tightly around the girl's waist.

It didn't take a native Spanish speaker to figure out what was going on--Gary knew an apology when he heard it. Poor kid. Pushing himself off the pavement to stand, Gary brushed snow from his sleeves, then realized that he was much better protected against the cold than the children. They were not only poorly dressed, they were both as skinny as rails. Absorbed in comforting her brother, her long hair spilling over her shoulders to cover both their faces, Lucy was mumbling softly in Spanish, crooning almost, while the little boy's sobs subsided.

"What was he doing up there, anyway?"

Lucy's head came up, and there was something in her eyes, something frightened and a little bit...wild, Gary decided. Sniffling, Bernardo somehow managed to turn and look at him without releasing his hold on his sister.

"Where are your parents?"

Lucy pried her brother's arms off her waist. Still holding one hand, she pulled him behind her, staring up at Gary in rebellious silence.

"Look, it's really cold, and you know you shouldn't be out here. Why don't we go find your mom and dad, huh?"

"Mama?" Bernardo whimpered. He peeked out from behind his sister, staring at Gary like a field mouse cornered by a hawk.

"Hey, c'mon kid--Lucy, right? Why don't you come with me, and I'll help you find your folks." Gary took a step toward the pair, one hand out in what he intended as a sign of friendship, an offer of help. Instead, Bernardo ducked back behind Lucy, and Lucy, well--

She cringed.

There was no other word for it; she cringed, withdrew into herself, stared at him with almost-black eyes, equal parts defiance and fear, and seemed to shrink to half her size. She stepped backward, pushing her brother along behind her. "Stay away from us," she whispered.

"Wait a minute--" Befuddled, Gary froze. Why in the world would anyone be afraid of him? "I'm not--Hey, it's okay." He dropped his hand back down to his side, but the action engendered no relief in the children. "I'm just trying to help."

Lucy stood up straight again and shook her head. Strands of her dark hair slapped her in the face. "We don't need any help."

"Look, kid--"

"Mama!" Lucy stood on tiptoe, waving at someone behind Gary's back. "Mama, over here!"

Gary wheeled to see who it was she was trying to flag down, relieved beyond all telling to know that these kids had a parent, negligent though she might be.

No one was there.

The upper deck of the pier was as deserted as before, and Gary turned back quickly, only to see a wave of black hair disappearing down the pier steps. He jumped to follow the kids, but didn't quite clear the fence this time. Stiff from the fall and the roll on the cold ground, he tripped over the thigh-high railing and sprawled on the icy pavement.

"Damn!" Scrambling up as best he could, he hurried down the stairs, ignoring the jarring pain in his elbow where he had tried to stop his fall. "Lucy! Bernardo!" he called. "I wanna help you, c'mon, where'd you go?" But there was no one, not on the steps or anywhere near them. Gary ran to the other side of the stairway, checked the doors to the inside shops, which were locked, so they couldn't have gone there. He got into the jeep and covered the length of the pier, even the parking garage, but there was no sign of the children. They had vanished. Even the security guard he finally found and convinced to help search, once the guy had seen the door of one of the Ferris Wheel cars swinging open, couldn't track them down.

Discouraged, Gary thanked him, and checking the paper one last time, headed home. It was after two in the morning; long past closing time for McGinty's.

Parking his jeep under the streetlight in the alley, Gary took the keys out of the ignition and sat in the rapidly-cooling car for a long time, just thinking.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~


	2. Chapter 2

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

_Never came the winter stars more clear_  
 _yet the stars lost themselves_  
 _midnight came snow-wrought snow blown_  


~ Carl Sandburg

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

The night kept its promise several times over. While Gary dozed in fitful sleep, the wind shifted, the air warmed, and the snow fell. And fell. And blew, and fell some more. By the time the alarm went off, Gary's room was bathed in a weird, soft light, the streetlights' beams catching the glint of snowflakes through his windows as they fell with serious purpose to the ground below. He peeked at them through half-open eyes, then threw the covers back over his head, muffling the chipper female voice from the radio.

"Well, Chicago, I'd say good morning, but I'm not sure how good it's going to be. Old Man Winter decided to pick on our rush hour today, and if you're planning on being somewhere anytime soon, it's not going to happen. At least ten inches have fallen already in the downtown area, they're up to a foot at O'Hare, and it's still coming down, folks. This storm took everyone by surprise, including meteorologists and the city road crews."

Gary blinked into flannel-soft darkness, rubbing his face in the pillow. Surprise was right--not even the _Sun Times_ had managed to catch this one for the morning edition, or he would have known just how bad it was going to be. Of course, his attention had been focused on more than weather reports the night before.

"Most area schools are closed, and the mayor's office has declared a snow emergency, so no one should be out on the roads unless it's absolutely necessary. If you're parked on a designated snow route, you'll need to get that car shoveled out and moved before the plows come. Might be next spring before you see your vehicle if you don't."

Anyone dumb enough to park on the streets this time of year without a good shovel handy deserved what they got. Still not quite awake, Gary found himself grinning at a memory--Chuck stumbling into McGinty's just after another January storm, crusted in white from hat to boots. He'd walked all the way from his apartment because, although he'd planned ahead enough to have a shovel, he'd left it locked in the trunk of the Lexus, which ended up buried in an inch of ice and two feet of snow. Well, at least Chuck didn't have to worry about that in California.

The grin faded as the familiar "meow-plop" from the landing brought Gary fully awake. He wasn't sure which he dreaded more--a day full of disasters, or one that left him too much time to think about what he hadn't done.

Not that it mattered, he thought as he swung his legs out from the warmth of the covers. It wasn't as if he had any choice, one way or the other.

Padding across the hardwood floor to the door, he felt the chill as the gale battered the windows and snuck in the cracks, wrapping itself around his bare feet. He really needed to caulk around those openings; he might as well be out in the snow himself at this rate--

The thought pulled him up short. Damn. People _were_ out in the storm--specifically, two scared kids that Gary should have found last night. He hurried to open the door, hoping that the paper would prove true to form--the form it'd had right up until the last few weeks, anyway--that it would give him some clue about how to help Lucy and Bernardo. Cat scurried inside without a second "meow" and jumped up on the bed, settling into the warmth Gary had left behind. Ignoring it, he flipped through the pages in hopes of seeing a name, a description, a headline that would ring a bell or touch a nerve.

But there wasn't any. There was nothing. Just one rescue that he needed to worry about, and it wasn't until later in the day. One teenager mugged over near Wrigley, not a big deal at all. The snow was going to stop hours before it happened. Dropping the paper onto the coffee table, he flopped into his overstuffed armchair with a sigh of frustration.

This was getting damn weird.

Since the big 2000 New Year's run of minor, party-related disasters, his duties had been light, almost ridiculously so. At first, he'd thought he was just readjusting to a normal load after the holiday rush, but it had been three weeks since the paper had given him anything resembling a busy day, and there was definitely something else going on here. It was almost as if whatever sent him the paper was trying to tell him something, but he didn't know what it could be.

Fine. Not like he wanted to be running around in the snow anyway. Gary propped his feet on the coffee table and picked up the remote.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~ 

Roused out of a stupor that he wanted to blame on the still-falling snow and grey skies, Gary didn't realize at first that it was the ringing of his phone that had brought him back to awareness. The answering machine was clicking on when he finally reached for the handset.

"Hello?"

"Gary, you're home." It was both a statement and a question.

"Way to go, Nancy Drew."

He tried to make it sound teasing, but he heard the hesitation before Marissa answered, and hoped it didn't mean she'd taken offense at the edge in his flip reply.

"It's just--with the storm and all, I thought maybe you'd be busy with the paper today."

Gary cast a resentful glare at the _Sun-Times_ , being put to use protecting the table's finish from a long-since-cooled mug of coffee. "No, not until three or so."

Another hesitant pause, as if there was something else he was supposed to tell her. "Okay," she finally said, "I was just calling to let you know that I thought we should probably declare our own snow day. I've already contacted everyone who's supposed to work today, to tell them not to come in. I didn't think it would be worth someone getting hurt trying to get through the mess outside. Just walking Reilly to the corner this morning was tough going."

"Sounds good. Thanks." Gary was about to say more, but his attention was caught by something on the television set, and he reached for the remote, turning up the volume. Here she was again, the same reporter who'd been on the scene all morning...

"...you all right? Gary?"

"I'm fine," he mumbled. His jiggling foot knocked against the table, and drops of coffee landed on the front page story about the snowstorm.

Marissa's voice grew sharper. "What's going on? Are you--is that the television?"

"CNN. Did you hear about this?" he asked abruptly. He pointed at the television set with the remote, as if that would explain everything.

"Hear about what? What in the world--"

"Memphis."

"Excuse me?"

"Memphis, this train derailed in Memphis. Amtrak. They think there was ice on the track. There're forty people in the hospital and three dead." Gary closed his eyes, but the pictures wouldn't go away. He changed the channel to Headline News, which was just as bad.

"That's terrible." He knew Marissa meant it; unlike other people who tut-tutted over the misfortune of strangers, she really would be troubled by the news. "I didn't know. I've been listening to the local news, and that's all about the weather."

"And a bomb went off in Belfast. Nobody knows who did it, and so they're all running around trying to blame the IRA, and the IRA's trying to blame the--the other guys, but it was probably just someone trying to make one side or the other look bad. Thing is, it went off right in the middle of a busy store--"

"Gary." Marissa's tone was knife-edged now, demanding his attention. "What is this about? Have you been sitting around stewing over this all morning?"

"I'm not stewing." He made the screen dark and silent with a frustrated stab at the remote and stood, glaring at the still-snoozing cat on his bed.

Traitor.

"Then what is it, what's bothering you?"

He paced around the coffee table, past the metal shelving that served as an entertainment center, and wiped condensation off the window that overlooked the alley. The trash dumpster was half-buried in snow, and the pile on its lid climbed even further up the building.

"Gary?"

"None of it was in the paper," he blurted out by way of explanation. "Not the bomb, not the train, not even the storm."

"You mean yesterday's paper."

"Today's."

"The one you got yesterday."

"No. I mean, yes, that one, but no, those stories weren't in it."

"Well, there are a lot of stories that don't make it into your paper, aren't there?" Gary opened his mouth to reply, but Marissa rushed on. "We've talked about this before. There's a reason you don't see everything. There's no way you can handle every problem in the world. You're going to give yourself an ulcer as it is, doing what you already do here in Chicago."

Shaking his head in frustration, Gary stalked away from the window, all the way across the loft to the bed, scowled at Cat for a few more seconds, then began pulling clothes out of the armoire. "That's just it. Lately I haven't even been doing what I do. It's all piddly stuff--D'you know, two days ago I stopped a fender bender out in Cicero just for something to do?" He looked down at what he'd gathered to wear for the day--jeans so old they had holes in the knees, a red plaid flannel shirt, and a navy turtleneck sweater. Brilliant fashion statement. Throwing the whole lot to the ground, he took a deep breath, trying to find the words to explain what was bothering him. This was Marissa, who knew him and the paper better than anyone else, and it was still hard. "It's like the paper doesn't need me for anything important anymore. Even when it's important, it's not--it's not enough, you know?"

There was another moment of hesitant silence. "No, I guess I don't," Marissa said slowly. "Gary, what in the world are you talking about?"

"I don't know--it's--it's about the big stuff, and it's about little stuff, too." He stared out the window by his bed, watching the snow sift through the air. "Lucy and Bernardo."

"Who?"

"These kids, last night on Navy Pier. Remember when I left late last night?" Feeling lost in his own apartment, Gary wandered back to the living area as he related the story, rushing through the rescue and focusing on what had happened afterward. "They weren't in the paper again this morning," he finished. "How do I know they're okay?"

"I--I guess you can't," Marissa said, her tone softer now, "unless you trust the paper. You can't fix everything, as much as you might want to. Besides," she added with a forced attempt at cheerfulness, "the odds are they went right home and are busy keeping the whole thing secret from their parents. I bet that's why they ran off. Didn't you ever keep secrets from your folks because you didn't want to get into trouble, or to worry them?" When Gary didn't answer, she asked pointedly, "Like, say, the fact that you get tomorrow's news?"

"Yeah, yeah, I get it." He'd kept that from his parents for a year. Gary plopped back down in his chair, picked up a pencil from the end table, and tapped it against the overstuffed armrest. "But you didn't meet those kids, Marissa, and you didn't see the way that girl flinched back when I reached out my hand. I think they've got more to worry about than being grounded. What if their parents are the reason she was afraid of me?"

"If you think that, then why didn't you--"

"Look for them? I did, most of the night. I didn't get back here until after two, and I went over the pier from one end to the other at least three times."

"You saved that little boy's life. It might not be everything he needs, but believe me, it matters. Maybe it's all you can do for now."

The pencil stopped. "What good is it, if it just sends them back to a life that makes them cower? What good am I? And it's not like I can say I was doing something more important, like stopping that train wreck or getting the people who were hurt in the bombing out of that grocery store."

"In Belfast." He could hear the confusion in her voice.

"But that's the kind of stuff I should be stopping, isn't it? With phone calls, or...or something. Or going there, if I can." Leaning forward, he started beating the pencil against the edge of the coffee table. One and two and three and *crack*. The top half went flying and bounced off the TV screen while Gary stared at the broken end in his hand. Shaking his head, he tossed it on the table. "I could have gone to Memphis and--"

"Is that what you want?" He could almost hear Marissa's eyes widening. "You're already covering the entire city of Chicago, but you think you should be running around the whole country, or the world?"

"I don't know, I--" Gary sighed. He was getting tired of thinking about it. "Look, I should probably head downstairs, make sure everything's okay down there and get the walk shoveled."

"But Gary--"

"I'll be okay. I just don't know what's going on with the paper these days, that's all."

"That's a pretty big 'that's all'." Marissa's attempt at sarcasm couldn't mask her concern.

"Yeah, well, I'll just take it as it comes, I guess."

She waited, and Gary knew she wasn't satisfied with his attempt at resolution, but she didn't press the issue. "Where did you say you had to go this afternoon?"

"Somewhere west of River North, some alley." Heaving himself to his feet, Gary yanked the paper out from under the mug and knocked it over. He muttered a half-hearted curse at the pool of coffee that dripped from the table to the floor.

"What's wrong now?"

"Nothing, just spilled some coffee." Phone tucked under his chin, he tromped to the kitchen, returning with a towel.

"So what's the story, what do you have to stop?"

"It's just a mugging. Hold on a sec." Kneeling to swipe at the mess, Gary reached under the table to make sure he got all of the spreading pool, and his hand brushed a handful of papers free. Collecting the pages of sunflower stationery and newspaper clippings with his free hand, he stood and picked up the phone.

Marissa didn't miss a beat. "'Just?' Gary, you--"

"So that's where the damn thing went."

She sighed. "You know, you'd think being on the phone wouldn't be any more confusing than being in the same room with you, but I'm completely lost--again."

"Sorry," Gary mumbled as he flipped through the pages in his hand. "I just found the letter my mom sent after Christmas. You know how she is, she had to send clippings from the social section of the Hickory paper, all about the people I went to school with and how they came back to visit over the holidays and what they're doing with their lives. Oh, and don't forget, how many grandchildren they've given her friends."

A rueful chuckle sounded in his ear. "Oh, no."

"Oh, yeah." Gary didn't find the situation amusing at all, at least not right now. "She always mentions the grandchildren. I can never tell if I'm supposed to be impressed by the fact that Tommy Barnes is a doctor, or if that's supposed to be some kind of hint, but the grandchildren--there's nothing subtle about that at all." Gary tossed the letter and clippings onto the table and perched on the arm of the chair.

"She just wants what's best for you."

"What she wants is to be able to show off pictures and newspaper clippings of her own." Every year it was the same thing. It also happened after every high school reunion, none of which he'd ever attended. "I guess I can't blame her, but there's not a whole lot I can do about it." Glancing at his watch, he added, "I really gotta get a shower here and take care of a couple things before I go."

"About that mugging, Gary--"

"It's no big deal," he assured her. "Most of the time these guys see someone else around and run."

"Well, you should still be careful." Gary almost smiled--he hadn't needed a magic paper to know that was coming. "You know," Marissa continued, in a tone that was almost as casual as she probably intended it to be, "that neighborhood's not so far from my place. Why don't you stop over when you're done? I'll make hot chocolate or something. It might be nice to just visit like normal people for once."

Gary's mouth twisted into a wry grin. He could give her bonus points for the hot chocolate, but a major deduction would have to be taken in the subtlety category. The real purpose of the invitation was almost as transparent as his mom's prodding. Not that he was winning any points right now, not for anything. "If I can. No promises, though."

"None necessary," she answered lightly. "I'm not going anywhere, so just stop by later if you get a chance."

It didn't escape Gary's notice that she waited for his good-bye before saying her own, nor that she let him hang up first. Marissa usually didn't do that, but he knew he had her at least a little worried. Well, he'd been trying to figure out what was going on here for the past few days, and now the snow had slowed him down enough that he didn't have much else to occupy his time. Maybe having someone to talk it out with wouldn't be such a bad thing.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~


	3. Chapter 3

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_The ways deep and the weather sharp,_  
 _The very dead of winter_.  


~ T. S. Eliot

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

By the time the snow stopped early that afternoon, there was a foot and a half of it sitting on top of downtown Chicago. The wind died down and the plows got to work, thoroughly annoying the citizenry by not plowing some streets, and doing the job so well on others that mountains of snow blocked the driveways. From the sounds of the editorials and "person on the street" interviews in the next day's _Sun-Times_ , the mayor and other assorted city bureaucrats were going to hear plenty of complaints about how long it would take to get traffic moving again.

Gary didn't have time to wait for the road crews to get their job done. The L took him part of the way to his destination, but he had to trudge the last half mile on foot, through drifts that often came up to his knees. He remembered what fun he'd had tromping through snow storms like this when he was a kid, imagining, with his friends, that they were mighty explorers crossing the Alps with a train of elephants and camels behind them. Okay, so their geography and zoology had been a bit mixed up. It had still been fun.

There weren't many kids out in this part of town. In the past twenty years or so, River North had gone through several distinct transformations, from abandoned warehouses to starving artists' lofts to an upscale yuppie neighborhood. The artists could no longer afford to live above the galleries that sold their work, and the people who lived here now didn't seem to think children went with their "lifestyle." Today the area was quiet; the boutiques, galleries, and coffee shops were empty. With everyone in hibernation, Gary had the snow banks and the streets all to himself.

He made his way through the world of chic lifestyles and double lattes and into the more run-down neighborhood to which those who'd been misplaced by the trendification of River North had migrated. Here the shops were darker, outside and in; there were no Starbucks, and the galleries had hand-painted signs and erratic hours. Blank and broken windows marched up the sides of buildings above tobacco shops, convenience stores, and used book sellers. But people lived up there; the lights against the still-grey sky told Gary that most of them were huddled inside. He wondered briefly how many of the low-rent lofts around here had adequate heat, and shivered, grateful for his thick blue parka, his stocking cap, his gloves--even for the bright red scarf his mom had made so many years ago.

It was an eerie, almost alien landscape, this grey-white version of Chicago. The lines of the buildings were softened; the brick walls seemed to be leaning against the snow banks, instead of the other way around. Every once in a while a stiff breeze would pick up the top layer of snow and cast it around in a fine, lazy swirl, but otherwise the winds of the early morning had died down.

And everywhere, Gary realized, he was looking for a shock of long dark hair cascading down the back of a too-thin coat, next to a blue sweatshirt and dirty sneakers. He couldn't believe the paper would have dropped Lucy and Bernardo just like that, but they were nowhere to be found. He told himself firmly that Marissa was right--he needed to focus on the business at hand, instead of worrying about what he couldn't change. But no matter how much he wanted to dismiss what had happened last night, he couldn't shake the image of a girl shrinking back from him in fear.

The story that had brought him here was about another girl, seventeen or eighteen, who'd been--or rather, was going to be--stabbed several times, beaten, and left unconscious in what appeared to be a mugging. She'd be found, face down in an alley, at 3:30, so Gary had come plenty early; it was now just past three. The farther he walked, the more dilapidated the neighborhood became. He hurried down a street of shops, barely tended from the looks of them, and almost nothing was open. The paper had given cross streets, but not the actual alley, and there were plenty of them here--plenty of dark, hidden spaces, obscured even more by the snow banks.

Finally, he heard voices and slowed his footsteps. Between a boarded-over nightclub and a hardware store with caged windows, in an alley barely wide enough for the fire escapes on both buildings, stood a man and a girl. From the corner around which he peeked, Gary could see the impending disaster. The man loomed over the girl, while she pressed against the brick wall, her head darting back and forth, looking for an escape that refused to present itself. Her voice was high and breathless.

"Please, please Eric, I swear I'll do anything--"

His eyes adjusting to the gloom, Gary saw that the man had one gloved hand braced against the wall, blocking the girl's escape with the small knife he held. The other hand had been in the guy's pocket, but now it shot out and grabbed her shoulder.

"You know the rules, baby. You don't go to nobody else." He twisted his wrist, pressing the knife against the girl's ear, and Gary realized that the sound he could barely hear was her whimpering.

This was more than a mugging. Gary had to do something, fast. There was a wasit-high snow bank blocking the entrance on his side, and he wasn't sure he could get through it without attracting attention. On the other hand, he didn't want to take the time to go around the block. Hoping against hope that the man would turn out to be the kind of sewer rat who'd disappear at the first threat, Gary kicked his way through the pile, yelling at the same time. "Hey! Get away from her!"

The man turned without releasing his hold on the girl's shoulder. Free of the deepest snow, Gary simply ran straight at him--and hit a patch of ice. His feet flew out from under him, and he landed face first in the alley.

Callous laughter rang above his pounding head, but so did frightened gasps of breath. Gary scrabbled for footing, but rose only halfway before something cold and metallic pricked his nose. Hands spread out to the side, he froze, staring down at the knife point resting on his skin. Okay, maybe this one wasn't the sewer rat type--even though he looked it, with a thin black mustache and beady gray eyes.

"Who the hell are you?" he snarled at Gary.

"I--"

"Trying to hone in on my territory? Stealing my client?"

Gary dared to let his gaze flicker over to the girl, huddled now against the wall as if she wanted to disappear into it, but still watching the scene before her with huge, round eyes framed by dark circles. She was so skinny her pea coat seemed to swallow her up, her cheeks hollow, dishwater blond hair limply framing a face devoid of makeup. Not that kind of client, then--this guy wasn't a pimp.

"I'm not gonna let you beat up an innocent kid--"

"Innocent?" scoffed the man, pressing the knife point a fraction further into Gary's skin. "She's hardly innocent. What d'you care about her for, anyway?"

Gary didn't have a ready answer, and he knew he couldn't stay crouched much longer--he'd turn into a popsicle and fall over. So he jumped forward, grabbing for the guy's knees. The knife point scraped across his nose and away as Gary tackled the man to the ground, shouting to the girl, "Get out of here, get some help!"

He heard her footsteps and ragged breath pass him, then fade away; he got to his knees, reaching for the guy's wrist. He managed the grab just before the knife would have been in his eye. Gary squeezed hard and the weapon popped out and fell off to the side. Pushing the man's other shoulder down with one hand, Gary fought to hold onto his wrist as well, knowing his opponent would just as soon blacken his eye as cut it.

For a moment they remained that way, opposing forces equally balanced. Gary tried to decide which would be worse--to try to hold onto this guy, or let him go? He didn't have long to worry about the choice. Squirming and struggling, the wiry man below him finally managed to roll over and turn the tables as he pinned Gary to the ground, one knee in his stomach.

"You--you..." His stream of none-too-polite names was interrupted when Gary got an arm free and went for his face. Apparently he valued his looks; he ducked, leaving Gary with enough momentum to shove him off and to the side. Scrambling to his feet, Gary braced himself for another attack, but as the man ran at him, something wet, cold, and white exploded between them.

Gary's hands came up to keep the snow out of his face, and he staggered back against the building. He felt the bricks pressing through his parka; heard shouts, and then snowballs hitting their target with soft "thump"s. Bringing his hands down, he saw the snow-coated attacker dashing for the far end of the alley, running and slipping as fast as his feet would carry him.

"Got him!"

"'Bout time. Your aim sucks, dude."

"I'm not the one who hit the good guy!"

Gary turned toward the chortling shouts of triumph. Three men were coming toward him at a trot. He allowed himself to relax, brushing snow and the feeling that the knife point was still on his nose off his face.

One of the trio approached, holding out a mittened hand. "You okay?"

Gary nodded. "Thanks." The young man before him had spiky blonde hair and several earrings on each ear; he wore a dark brown barn coat and a brightly striped scarf wrapped loosely around his neck. He reached over and clapped Gary on the shoulder.

"No, man, thank you. Trini came running out and said that sleazeball had come after her--she could'a been dead meat if you hadn't stopped him."

Heart pounding, still trying to catch his breath, Gary asked, "Trini? That girl? Yeah, he had a knife. He was gonna hurt her."

The other two had come to join them. They were all older than the girl, Gary decided, probably in their early twenties. The tallest of the group, who had longish brown hair with one white streak down the side, looked more panic-stricken than victorious. "Shit." Turning to look behind him, he said, "You'd better lay low for a while if he--Trini? Where'd she go? She was right behind us!" Without another word, he ran back to the street.

"Hey--" Gary took a step to follow, but the blond kid stopped him, a hand on his arm.

"It's okay. Rob'll find her, and Eric's not gonna show his face for a couple of days now, not after we spread the word that we ran him off with a few snowballs." A wide grin spread across his face, and he released Gary's arm to hold out a hand to shake. "I'm Jeff, and this is Luke." He nodded at the kid standing next to him, who shook Gary's hand in turn. This one had an earring too, a bright silver hoop against warm brown skin, accented by short cropped curly hair.

"Gary." He nodded toward the end of the alley where the third one, Rob, had disappeared. "You guys friends of that girl? Because I think there's more wrong with her than just some pimp or drug dealer or whatever he was--"

Luke closed his eyes and shook his head, while Jeff's grin faded a bit. "Yeah," he said softly, "there is. And you got it on the second guess."

It took a minute, in his befuddled state, for Gary to figure out what that meant. Apparently reading his confusion, Luke offered, "Drugs. Heroin. She's eighteen going on eighty, the way that stuff's eating up her life. Stupid shit."

So, someone else he'd saved from one fate, only to leave them to something that might be just as bad. Gary's shoulders slumped, his adrenaline draining away.

"Hey, man, your nose is bleeding." Jeff reached up and swiped at his own face, indicating the location of the cut.

Gary couldn't even feel it, he was so cold. "It'll be fine," he said with a shrug.

Jeff and Luke exchanged a glance. "Well, heck, come have a cup of coffee or something and get warm, okay? We were just heading over to Luigi's. He's gotta be open; he lives right above the hole in a wall he calls a restaurant."

"Bistro," said Luke. "Remember? He thinks it's classier if he calls it something Italian."

"Last month it was something French," Jeff told Gary. They all climbed over the snowbank at the end of the alley. "Café Quelle Domage or something like that."

Still staring off in the direction Rob had gone, Gary asked, "You sure they're gonna be okay?"

"Oh, no worries, man. She'll listen to Rob play his guitar and they'll kiss and make up, for a couple of hours at least. It'll be days before Eric shows up here again." Jeff grinned and pointed down the block, shouting, "Sally ho and tally forth, men! Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we--we freeze! Besides," he added, glancing at Gary over his shoulder, "you probably gotta go back to work at the office before too long, don't you?"

Gary blinked. "Office? What office?"

"Oh, sorry, dude. You just look like someone who works a niner-fiver. You know, Cubicle Man." They rounded a corner, and headed down another snow-blanketed street of shabby buildings.

"I--well, I used to be, but I don't exactly keep regular hours these days." Gary was starting to shiver; the snow that had slipped under his collar, cuffs, and boots during the scuffle in the alley was melting against his skin.

"That's cool," Luke said with a nod. "You in television?"

"Television?"

"Yeah, man, you look like some kinda anchorboy. You in the news?"

Gary couldn't help but snort. "Not exactly." If they only knew.

"Nah, he's too cool for that," Jeff answered for him. "No anchorman would be stickin' his pretty face in an alley for Eric to knife." He turned to Gary with a frown. "Why were you down here, anyway? I mean, how did someone like you--"

"Actually, I run a bar," Gary filled in hurriedly, hoping to forestall any questions about how he'd known what was going to happen in the first place. "Kinda downtown, it's called McGinty's."

"So you're slumming, or what? How'd you end up here on a day like today?" Jeff pointed at a badly-lettered window in a building across the street. Sure enough, it read "Luigi's" in faded blue paint, with "Bistro" underneath in bright red.

"Oh, I was--uh--scouting new locations, I guess, and I kinda got lost," Gary fumbled as they crossed the street, not even bothering to look for oncoming traffic.

Jeff shot another frown at him as he held the door open, but Luke elbowed his friend as he went past. "Give him a break, man. He saved Trini's butt out there--d'ya really care what he was doing on our turf?"

"Nah, guess not." Together, they led Gary into the dimly-lit bistro.

"Whacha doin' here?" The gruff greeting came from the dark recesses of the room. That's all the place was, Gary realized as his eyes adjusted to the gloom--a room, and not a very big one at that. A handful of card tables, surrounded by rickety folding chairs, were scattered about the place. Travel posters with ripped edges hung on the walls, and candles in red glass holders lent the only hint of warmth.

"Chill it, man, we just came for something to drink." Jeff's tone was casual, as was his slouch. "You got coffee ready?"

"Not for you." The man who emerged from the far corner wore a dirty white apron over an ill-fitting grey sweater and slacks. A full head shorter than Gary, he glared up at the trio with his arms folded across his chest.

"Aw, c'mon, we're your regulars." Luke's grin said he enjoyed teasing the shorter man.

"Regular pests is what you are. Come in here and take up my tables and never pay."

Jeff ran a hand through his spiky, ash-blond hair, and it stood up straighter than ever. "Oh, yeah, like you got a waiting list or something."

"I got a real customer here." Luigi gestured behind Jeff, and Gary turned to see who'd come in after them, but the man grabbed his arm, leading him to what he must have considered a good table.

"Oh, no, wait, I--I'm with them." Gary pointed at Jeff and Luke, who were watching the scene with amusement. Luigi dropped his arm like a hot potato. He conveyed his disappointment with a look that Gary had previously thought could only come from his mother.

"What, you stupid or something? You go buying snow sculptures from this artist?" He spat out the word as he waved a meaty hand at Jeff.

Snow sculptures? Gary turned a perplexed look on his new friends. "I--uh--"

"Dude, he is so not stupid," said Luke, indignant. "He just--"

"Dropped by to see me, he's my cousin," Jeff filled in quickly, eliciting a confused look from his buddy.

"Yeah," Gary confirmed. "That's right, and I--I'm buying."

"Molto Buono!!" Luigi's demeanor changed utterly; he pulled out a chair and beamed at all three men. "Sit, sit, I make you my best lunch, I promise you--"

"No, no, I just want a cup of coffee," Gary protested. "And a place to clean up." He rubbed his nose; now that he was someplace relatively warm, the small amount of blood from the knife cut was itching where it had dried.

"Over there." Luigi pointed at a door in the corner that still had a French sign: "Hommes". His enthusiasm was somewhat more subdued, but not gone altogether, and he whistled as he made his way through a set of swinging doors to what Gary assumed was the kitchen. The aroma of tomato sauce wafted out, and as he opened the door to the men's room--which issued another, less tempting odor--Gary turned to see Luke and Jeff staring longingly at the kitchen.

"Uh, on second thought?" he called.

"Sì?" Luigi poked his head out.

"Lunch. For all of us."

Gary ignored Luigi's wide, triumphant grin, and the incredulous stares directed at him from the table. Shutting the door, he allowed himself a moment to just breathe in the quiet, if not the stench, before turning on the water. Unable to find any paper towels, or even a dispenser for them, he settled for splashing water on his face and wiping it off with the neck of his sweater.

He peered into the scratched and cracked mirror for a minute, his own reflection staring back at him like a Picasso painting. No, he told the distorted face, he was not trying to make up for what he hadn't done for Lucy and Bernardo. Those guys out there just looked hungry, that was all. No big deal. Checking the paper, he found no new articles, so he rolled it up, stuffed it in the back pocket of his jeans, and returned to the dining room.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~


	4. Chapter 4

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_To dream, to hope, to imagine, to swoon,_  
 _to lie, to hold hands, to kiss, to create,_  
 _to allow, to accept, to be alive, to be aware,_  
 _to be present in my own life_  
 _This is my life--_  
 _The one we're in_  
 _We're here to learn_  
 _Meant to be._  


~ Jonathan Larson

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

The pasta that appeared at their table a few minutes later was certainly not the best Gary had ever had, but his companions devoured it with gusto. Remembering how hard it had been to get by when he first started out, even with a job that paid a decent wage, he found himself wondering just how often they ate balanced meals.

Gary picked at the food on his own plate, having downed a sandwich before he'd left home. "So--uh--snow sculptures?" he finally asked Jeff, whose blue eyes lit up at the question.

"I've been experimenting," he explained through a mouthful of garlic bread.

"Oh, yeah, experimenting." Luke snorted. "You gonna eat the rest of that?" He pointed with a fork at Gary's plate.

"Nah." Gary pushed it across the table.

"Experimenting," Jeff reiterated, picking up his water glass and gesturing with it for emphasis, "with natural media. The ephemeral nature of the snow sculptures, for example, adds to their poignancy. It's pure process." He flung his arms wide, his voice reverberating off the restaurant walls, his water sloshing over the tablecloth. "I'm just throwing my work out into the universe, until it all just kind of merges into one giant affirmation."

Gary raised his eyebrows. He wasn't sure if the explanation had gone over his head, or if the kid was just bullshitting.

"Translation: he's broke," Luke offered. "Can't afford scrap metal and welding supplies." He turned to Jeff. "The least you could do is make ice sculptures for weddings--you know, something you could actually get paid for?"

"Oh yeah? When's the last time one of your poems brought in any rent money?"

"When's the last time we paid the rent?"

Jeff clinked his fork against Luke's water glass. "Touché."

Luke's eyes narrowed like a gunfighter challenged by his rival. "Flambé."

"José."

"Monet." Luke pointed at Gary. "Your turn."

"Uh..." Gary got _what_ was going on, but he wasn't sure _why_. "Doris Day?"

The other two burst into laughter. "I dare you." Jeff pointed his fork at Luke. "Double dog."

Luke chewed on Gary's spaghetti for a moment, then swallowed. "Okay. Got it." He thumped a rhythm on the table with his fork and knife and recited,

"Touché, touché,  
Kiss my flambé,  
Touch the flame, José,  
Blur the edges, Monet,  
Que sera, baby,  
Be my Doris Day."

He finished the rhyme or rap or whatever it was with a flourish of rattling silverware.

It was awful; even Gary knew it. Jeff shook his head. "Man, I keep telling you, no one wants rhymes anymore. It's all about free verse."

"But dude, there's freedom in the structure. I could sell the stuff as song lyrics if Rob would ever get off his butt and write me some melodies."

"Speaking of Rob--" Jeff nodded at the door, which swung open to let in two figures and a swirl of wind and loose snow. "Here's the maestro now." The girl from the alley and the third snowballer headed toward the others, while Luke pulled a second table up to theirs.

"Hey," Luke nodded at Rob, but he was watching Trini closely, as were Jeff and Gary. "Everything cool?"

Rob nodded while Trini tossed her hair back from her shoulder, brushing snow off her pea coat. "Yeah," she said in a wispy cobweb of a voice. "Cool."

Rob held out a chair for her, then reached over to shake Gary's hand. "Thanks."

"Not a problem."

Trini spared a furtive glance at Gary, and even nodded at his "hi", but she didn't say anything, and quickly averted her eyes.

Luigi sidled over to their table, eyebrows lifted hopefully. "Hey, José and Doris Day, you eat, too?"

"Who?" Trini looked as confused as Gary had felt, so Luke performed his rap again, to catcalls and giggles.

"That completely sucked," Rob offered by way of comment, while Gary nodded at Luigi, waving his hand to indicate he should bring lunch for the newcomers.

"Well, if I could get you to write me some decent tunes, it wouldn't be so hard to come up with this stuff. What was your latest masterpiece? Something in the key of F flat diminished? I mean, who the hell is gonna buy a song they can't even play? Charlotte Church couldn't have hit the high note in that one!"

"You just didn't get it. I keep telling you--opera rap. It's gonna be the next big thing."

The discussion continued while Gary sat back, one hand warming as he wrapped it around his coffee cup, a chipped white mug with a logo from the Chicago World's Fair wearing away on its side. He wondered absently if it was an original. Looked old enough.

This wasn't the kind of place he would ever have walked into on his own, and these weren't the kind of people he would have sat with, but he liked them. They might not have had two cents to rub together, and they probably weren't going to make much of a name for themselves as artists, but they didn't seem to mind. Plus, they looked after each other. Jeff and Rob were soon giving Trini advice about how to get Eric off her case, though from the distracted way she replied to their exhortations, Gary wasn't sure they were having any impact. The girl tuned in to the conversation swirling around her every now and then, but mostly she sat and stared at the travel posters.

At least she was there, Gary reminded himself. That wouldn't have been the case if not for the paper. She was painfully thin, strung out or in need of a fix or something that Gary wasn't experienced enough to diagnose, but at least she wasn't lying unconscious in an alley.

Advice dispensed, the guys turned back to their rhyming game, which seemed to involve as many different beats, tunes, and directions as there were people. The impromptu party was getting boisterous as they all tried to pound out rhythms on the table, glasses, and, because he was shorter than the other two, Luke's head.

Every once in a while, Rob would lean over and say something to Trini, try to draw her into the conversation, but she remained aloof. Gary noticed that she was shivering long after the food and relatively heated room should have warmed her, and he elbowed Rob, nodding in the girl's direction. Rob got the point immediately. "Hey, how about some hot chocolate?" he called to Luigi.

Hot chocolate...on a day like today, that sounded even better than...oh, drat. Gary glanced at his watch; he'd totally forgotten Marissa's invitation. She wouldn't mind, she'd said she wouldn't, if he didn't show up, but she *would* worry.

"Hey," Gary asked when Luigi showed up with a tray full of steaming mugs, "you got a phone around this place?"

Luigi shook his balding head. "No phone. Too much."

"Yeah, besides, it might pull in customers," Rob cracked.

"Okay, well, then, I better go." Gary stood, and the others looked up at him, surprised.

"Dude, we're just getting started," said Luke.

"Well, uh, dude, you keep right on going, but I kinda told a friend of mine I'd come over, and she's gonna wonder what happened to me."

"Oh, a 'friend'?" Jeff elbowed Luke, who lifted his eyebrows and made sloppy kissing noises. The pair of them looked like a couple of fifth graders.

"No, really, she's just a friend, she's my partner at McGinty's." With a disgusted shake of his head, Gary turned to Luigi, who was hovering behind him, clearly distressed at his departure, and handed over some bills. "This cover it?"

"Sì, sì, buono, molto buono!" The beneficent smile was back; he took the money and then pumped Gary's hand in his own sweaty grip. "You come back?"

"Uh, well, maybe," Gary managed, disentangling himself and backing toward the door.

To his surprise, Jeff got up from the table and followed him. "Hey, man, I'll walk with you a ways. I wanna show you something."

"Uh--okay."

The younger man wrapped his rainbow-striped scarf around his neck and called, "Be back in a few," to his friends.

It was nearly five o'clock, and the shadows were lengthening as the sun began to set. Jeff pointed toward the opposite end of the block. "This way--there's a park there. The El's just two blocks down from it," he added when Gary looked dubious. Shrugging, Gary figured whatever it was must have been important if it was enough to tear the kid away from his friends and the warmth of the bistro.

They'd only taken a couple of steps through the deep snow before Jeff said, "Hey, Gary, look, I just wanted to say, don't be offended or anything if Trini didn't say much to you. She may not even remember what happened. She does that blocking out thing really well."

"I wasn't offended." Gary watched Jeff out of the corner of his eye, wondering what he was really getting at. "I was just hoping she'd be okay." Faint hope, he knew, not on the path that girl was taking.

For a few silent moments, they struggled through drifts that came up to Gary's knees. By mutual, unspoken agreement, they stepped into the deserted street, where a few cars had worn a more reasonable track. Gary was watching the shabby buildings for signs of life when Jeff said, "I grew up in Lake Forest, you know? Suburb kid. I like this part of town, it's more alive--well, most of the time--and inspiring, and everyone here is in it for the moment, you know? But I don't get the drugs and stuff either. Some people feel like they can't get out, I guess. We're trying to help Trini, but I don't know if it makes any difference."

"It matters," Gary told him, wishing he felt more sure of his words--well, they were more Marissa's than his own--wishing he could believe them. "Just trying matters."

Jeff was quiet again, digesting, Gary supposed. Then he surprised him by saying, "Thanks for everything. I mean it. Buying lunch, that was like...wow. You have no idea. Plus, you probably just doubled Luigi's monthly take."

Gary shrugged. "It's no big deal."

Jeff grinned. "Maybe not, but it matters."

They came around a corner and there was the park; an oasis of evergreen in the middle of the city. The playground equipment, perched in a clearing only a few feet from the sidewalk, was ancient. The metal was rusting in places, half the swings were gone, and the merry-go-round tilted precariously on its side, poking out of a snowbank. But behind all that there were pine trees, clustered tightly together and going back at least half a block. Their branches hung heavy with snow, and for a moment Gary was so absorbed in the picture-postcard at the back of the park that he didn't notice the strange figures dominating the playground. But Jeff clapped him on the shoulder, drawing Gary's attention to the foreground with a wave of his hand.

"This is what I wanted you to see. I mean, I know I'm not supposed to brag--I'm supposed to let the work speak for itself to whoever happens by, but I thought...I thought maybe you might be interested, since you asked, you know? Just to...to see them."

Gary barely heard what the man next to him was saying. He was too busy looking. The setting sun was coming through the cracks in the cloud cover, painting the snowy figures that dotted the playground in shades of orange, yellow, and pink. Gargoyles and trolls, mounds with abstract collections of spheres and pyramids, and what looked like a robot, were strewn among the playground equipment and the copse of trees.

"This is...this is pretty amazing," he said. He walked through the open gate for a better look, thinking that he should call Miguel Diaz. The guy would have a front-page photo for sure, and maybe Jeff would get some recognition. "I mean it, I'm impressed."

Jeff shrugged, but his eyes sparkled at the praise. "It's not that big a deal. Like Luke said, it's just 'cause I'm out of materials right now, until one of the galleries manages to sell something and I can buy more. But I like these, the ones I did today, better than most of what I've done the past year, if you can believe it. It was a good day," he added, arms crossed over his chest as he surveyed his kingdom with obvious satisfaction.

Wishing he could say the same, Gary stopped before a troll, whose white features glared up at him with unexpected venom. The thing looked alive. "So it doesn't bother you that you spend all this time on this stuff and nobody sees it, it doesn't last?"

"That's not the point. I mean it's nice, and everything, but it's really the process, you know? Watching it take shape under my hands--that's what it's all about. And if it doesn't last, well--there'll always be more snow in Chicago."

Gary snorted. "That's for sure." He scanned the playground, the trees, and wondered why they looked so familiar. Pointing to the tiny forest, he asked, "There's--there's a pond or something back there, isn't there?"

"Yeah, there were even kids here today who cleared it off and were playing hockey around the edges. I don't know how safe it was, but they seemed to be having a good time. You've been here before?"

"I guess so." It must have been a save; after the first year or so, a lot of them had just blurred together in Gary's memory. He shook off the feeling that there was something about the park he should remember, and turned back to Jeff. "I really need to go. But thanks for the tour. It was definitely...interesting. I'm impressed."

"Thanks, man. For everything." They shook hands and Jeff headed back the way they'd come, hands stuffed in the pockets of his battered coat. Gary took one more look around the park, then left the disapproving troll behind and crossed through the park to the El stop. 

 

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~


	5. Chapter 5

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_We've got two lives, one we're given_  
 _and the other one we make_  
 _And the world won't stop, and actions speak louder_  
 _Listen to your heart, and your heart might say_  
 _Everything we got, we got the hard way_  


~ Mary Chapin Carpenter

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Stomping and scraping snow off his boots, Gary buzzed Marissa's intercom.

"Gary? Is that you?"

"Yeah."

The door was opened almost immediately. "I'd just about given up on you. Come in quick, it's cold."

"You're telling me." Peeling off his gloves, Gary rubbed his hands together, grateful for the warmth of Marissa's home. His day, it seemed, was bound to be a series of freezings and thawings. He made sure he stayed on the welcome mat in the foyer; the tile and hardwood floors in the place would be a mess if he tracked snow all over them.

"I'm--uh, well, I'm sorry about being late. I kinda got sidetracked. Can I use your phone?"

Marissa gestured at the table to his right. "Sure." Leaning against the archway that led to the living room, she listened without comment while Gary fumbled through his wallet for the right card, then left a tip on Miguel Diaz's voice mail about the snow sculptures. When he finished, she picked up the conversation where they'd left off. "As far as being late, you're actually just in time for dinner, if you want to join me, but then I'm going to have to leave for choir practice."

Gary had bent down to remove his boots, but now he stood up again, frowning. "You're going to choir tonight? It's a mess out there, Marissa. I don't think you'll get a cab even if you call."

"You don't know Gail. Come hell or high water, we have practice every Tuesday." Marissa grinned. "Rain, sleet, snow, and dead of night have been known to stop the post office, but not Gail. Besides, I've been cooped up in the house all day, and I don't mind taking the L."

"There's more than a foot of snow out there, and that's where it isn't drifted. Nobody's shoveled their sidewalks, either. How are you gonna manage?" He knew the question would probably irritate her, but even though being blind didn't stop her from doing almost anything that she wanted to, Gary didn't see the point of taking this kind of a chance.

"How did you manage, Gary?" she asked archly, eyes flashing.

"C'mon, Marissa, I'm just looking out for you."

"I know you are, but sometimes you overdo it. I have dealt with snow before. Although," she added, her indignation disappearing as quickly as it had come, "I can't say I'd mind some help this time."

Marissa asking for help? That didn't happen every day. "Is that an invitation? What are you trying to do, convert me?"

"Of course not, Gary. It's just that it's too deep out there for the dog, and--"

"Doesn't matter," he grunted, bending down again to peel the boots off. "I'm all yours." Anything was better than going back to his loft alone and brooding over the paper. Besides, he was supposed to be paying more attention to his friend, isn't that what he'd promised? And when he thought about the consequences when he hadn't, he shuddered. Nope, no more of that. Lesson learned. "We'll manage together."

That seemed to be enough for Marissa; she led him through the living room and into the warmth of the kitchen, shooing away his offer to help with dinner. "Sit down and relax; it's almost done. I thought tomato soup and grilled cheese would be good comfort food on a day like today."

"Sounds great to me." Flicking on the overhead light in the grey dim, Gary tried to relax as ordered, but he couldn't help taking one more look through the paper. He noticed that Marissa raised an eyebrow when she heard the pages shuffling, but she didn't ask, just buttered bread and unwrapped cheese slices until Gary finished. There was nothing--again--and once again, he didn't know what to make of it. Tossing the paper onto the table, tapping the pine surface with impatient fingers, he noted that it had already been set for two. Sometimes Marissa's intuition was uncanny.

Her new guide dog, a golden retriever who'd been dozing on his pillow in the front room, padded into the kitchen and greeted Gary by plopping his head in Gary's lap, feathered tail wagging.

"Heya, mutt." Gary scratched the top of Reilly's head while the dog tried to lick his other hand. After a few casual inquiries about McGinty's and the storm, Marissa launched into detailed questions about the afternoon's save. By the time Gary finished telling her about Luigi's, there were sandwiches and hot soup on the table in front of him, and Reilly had settled in at his feet.

Marissa laughed when she heard about Luke's rapping game. "You weren't dancing on the tables, were you?"

"Huh?" Gary asked through a mouthful of grilled cheese.

Shaking her head, Marissa dismissed her own question. "They sound like that kind of a crowd--and not that I'm criticizing, Gary, but they don't sound like your kind of crowd. What made you stay?" She put her spoon down on the straw place mat deliberately, folded her hands in her lap, and turned her full attention on Gary. "What's really going on?"

Gary thought for a minute, peeling crusts off his sandwich and slipping them to an appreciative Reilly. The dog licked every trace of butter off of his fingers while Gary tried to explain. "It's like I said this morning: something's wrong with the paper. At least, that's what I thought, but now I'm thinking, maybe something's wrong with me. Why couldn't I help those kids last night? Or that girl today, Trini? I mean, even when I'm only doing little things, I can't do anything that matters."

Marissa went still, her eyes widening. "Gary Hobson, how in the world can you say that? That paper is a gift--"

"And I can't return it."

"But you want an exchange."

Wiping his fingers on his jeans, Gary stammered, "I--I didn't say that."

"That's what this is about though, isn't it? That's enough, Reilly," she added when the dog's nose followed Gary's hands back into his lap. Reilly sank back to the floor, still watching Gary with hopeful brown eyes. "Okay--when did all this start?"

"Right after New Year's." Gary slurped down a spoonful of soup, tangy and hot, but it wasn't as comforting as it should have been, not now that they were treading this terrain.

"That makes sense."

He frowned at Marissa. "What, are you saying the paper had a Y2K glitch?"

"Not the paper--you." At that, Gary fumbled with his water glass, nearly dropping it, and it clinked against the thick ceramic bowl. Marissa leaned toward him, gesturing with her spoon, becoming more animated as she worked through her theory. "Remember all the news pieces and programs that were on television around that time, about the major events of the past year? The past decade? Gary, how many times did you hear that and wish you could have known--about the plane crashes, the school shootings, the refugees, the natural disasters?" He didn't answer, squirming uncomfortably in his chair. "That's what you've been doing, isn't it? Eating your heart out over what you haven't done--even though you had no control over it at all?"

"Well, no, I--I mean, uh--"

Marissa pursed her lips, her expression impatient as she put the spoon in the bowl. "Don't even try to lie to me."

"Okay, the thought did cross my mind, but--" But he wasn't going to tell her, because he could hardly even admit to himself, just how hard it had been to see the retrospective the _Sun-Times_ had done about all that stuff, a slap in the face that had told him just what he hadn't been adequate enough to fix. "But why has it stopped giving me anything to do? Are you saying the paper is punishing me for not being able to do more?" He had to chew on his lip for a second before he could ask, "Marissa, do you--do you think the paper's lost faith in me?"

"No." The swift shake of her head was definite, but her impatience was gone. "That's not what I'm saying at all. You know--I know you know--that you can't do everything; you can't stop every bad thing that happens." She waited for a moment, then, when he didn't respond, she said, her voice gentle, "But I think you heard all that, and you started questioning, and--Gary, it sounds as if you've lost faith in yourself."

"I haven't--not exactly, anyway. It's hard to explain. It's like--well, today, for example. That girl still has bigger problems than I can help her with. I can stop one mugging, or a single traffic accident, but thousands of them still happen. It doesn't really *end* anything." He heaved a sigh and sat back in the chair, admitting, "I just--I don't know what the paper wants me to do anymore."

Marissa bit her lip, ran a finger around the rim of her glass. When she spoke again, her voice was more tentative, as though she wasn't sure of what she was about to say. "You want to know what I think?"

"Of course I do."

"Well, first of all, if the paper doesn't give you enough to do, I'm sure you can find ways to help people on your own, if that's what you want. And I have a feeling that is what you want, because that's the kind of person you are. The paper is a gift because it guides you in doing what you already want to do--whether you'll admit it or not," she added with a faint grin as Gary opened his mouth to protest. "But the second thing is, I think maybe this time is also a gift, like everything else that comes from...wherever the paper comes from. It's a chance to mull things over, and maybe to choose."

"To choose," Gary repeated flatly. He had no idea what his friend was getting at.

She nodded. "I was thinking today about when the paper first started coming to you. You had to make a pretty serious choice soon after that, remember?"

"Yeah." Gary cringed at the memory of carrying Amanda Bailey through congested streets while images of a plane crash echoed in his head. "Yeah, but that all worked out in the end. I saved the girl, and that stopped the plane crash."

"The point is, you didn't know it would work out. But you went with what you had to do, what your heart told you was right. And I think that set you on a course that you've been following ever since. For the most part, you help individuals--specific people, not mass hordes. People with faces you can see, who have problems that might seem small in the cosmic scope of things, but still--what you do matters to those individuals."

He knew it did, and he didn't think that was the point. "But is it enough?"

"That's what I think you have to answer for yourself. That's the choice I think you need to make now."

"Wait a minute." Gary shook his head, trying to get it clear; this was almost too big to grasp. "Are you--are you trying to tell me that you think that if I want to, I can change the kinds of stories the paper shows me?"

The expression on Marissa's face changed to one of pleased indulgence, that of a teacher whose pupil had finally seen the light. "That's it exactly. Look, I know you grumble about not having a choice when the paper shows you what's going to happen, but do you honestly think that getting that paper precludes your own free will?"

"I--uh--"

"Honestly."

Gary shrugged. "No, I guess not."

"So, let's say I'm right, just for now. You had to make a choice once. Would you choose differently this time? If you were up on that L platform and saw Amanda, and you didn't know that saving her would solve everything, right now, would you still give up the chance to stop the plane to save her?"

"But that's not a fair question." Suddenly restless, he disentangled himself from the furry paws and head that had laid claim to his socked feet, and went to the sink to refill his water glass. "That day--I wouldn't have made it if I'd gotten on the train. You guys got stuck, remember?"

Marissa shifted in her seat, keeping her face toward him. "Chuck and I did, yes. But Gary, I truly believe that if you'd gotten on the train, you would have made it to the airport and stopped that flight."

Gary stared at his friend; leaned back against the sink and took a sip of water as he processed what she was saying. He couldn't believe she'd put so much thought into this. "But not Amanda's death."

"No. And that's the point, Gary. You chose someone you could see, right there in front of you, over a couple hundred people. That's the kind of person you are--or at least, it's the kind of person you were then. Your compassion for an individual outweighed every other consideration. It was impulsive, but in a totally real, completely understandable way."

It might have been the point, but to Gary it seemed like a moot one. "But in the end it did stop the crash."

She nodded. "I think that was the paper's way of telling you that it was okay to choose Amanda, to pick one person over hundreds, to be who you are. It set you on a course, but I don't necessarily think you have to stay on that course if you don't want to. That's what you have to decide."

"Me?"

Again, Marissa nodded, her faith in what she was saying clear in her quiet pose and calm expression. How she could be so certain about it all was beyond Gary. It was a huge responsibility, and he wasn't sure he wanted it--or if it was even real. But Marissa seemed so sure. He drained his water glass, then returned to the table. "What do you think?" he hedged.

"It's not about what I think. It's about what you want. There's really not a wrong answer. The only failure would be to make no choice at all, and maybe that's why the paper's been so slow lately."

Gary thought about it for a minute, trying to imagine how different things might be. "So, you think if I sort of...ask...the paper would show me different stories, and I could maybe save more people?"

Marissa nodded. "Leading to all kinds of different consequences."

He fingered the sawtooth edge of the _Sun-Times_ , where the innocuous story about snow removal still graced the front page. "I could save a lot of people at once, if I could stop stuff like, like that train crash." His mind was racing now, catapulting over possibilities. "Or school shootings, or if I could warn people about earthquakes and tornadoes--"

"Gary, wait." Marissa held up a hand, her eyes growing wide with alarm. "You need to think this through, before you make any hasty decisions. Yes, you could help a great many people if you were to choose differently. But think about what you'd be exposed to--more publicity, more danger--think about that, okay?"

"It's numbers, though." Gary's foot started jiggling with impatience to get on with this. If Marissa was right...it would be great to be able to say he'd stopped some of the devastation that got paraded on the national news every evening. "You're serious about this, aren't you?"

"Yes..."

It was the hesitation in her tone that finally curbed his runaway thoughts. He peered at her more closely. "There's a 'but' in there somewhere."

"Gary, it is your choice. I'm more convinced of that now than ever."

"But?" he prompted.

"But...well, it's just...I do see your point. And given the choice, most people would save the plane, the people in that grocery store in Belfast, or the ones on the train. And they wouldn't be wrong. You wouldn't be wrong. But what happens to everyone else? To the homeless kids and the starving artists and the careless photographers and...and..."

Her fingers were toying with the edge of the place mat. For once, it was Gary's turn to make an intuitive leap. "And blind people who get in the way of idiot drivers?"

"I didn't mean that." But she ducked her head, embarrassed, and he knew he'd been right. He reached across the table, touching her hand so she'd know he was serious.

"I'll always be here for you, Marissa, no matter what."

"I know." She closed her eyes for a moment and squeezed his hand, then smiled. "And I also know that it's easy to sit here and play devil's advocate when the decision's not mine to make. It's yours, and whatever you choose, I know it'll be the right thing, as long as you go with what's in your heart."

"You know, you're always saying stuff like that. What if I don't know what I want?"

"But you do." Marissa stood and gathered dishes to carry to the sink. "It's just that you're the only one who does. Give yourself a little time, Gary, and you'll figure it out."

"Yeah, right." He got up to help clear the table. "What am I supposed to do in the meantime?"

"In the meantime," Marissa said, frowning as her fingers brushed the dial of her Braille watch, "You can help me get to church before Gail kicks me out of the choir."

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~


	6. Chapter 6

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_When I rise, I rise in glory_  
 _If I do, I do by grace_  
 _Time will wash away these footprints_  
 _And we'll leave without a trace_  
 _Between here and now and forever_  
 _There's such precious little time_  
 _What we do in loving kindness_  
 _Is all we ever leave behind_

~ Carrie Newcomer

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

The church was warm, well-lit, and busier than Gary had expected. In addition to the choir members milling up front, whom Marissa hurried to join as soon as he'd taken her coat, there were assorted husbands and kids hanging around, probably tagalongs like Gary who had been brought for navigation, protection, or lack of baby-sitters. Gail's son Chris was with a knot of kids back in one corner, huddled over their ubiquitous Pokemon games. A group of men created a slightly larger mirror image as they gathered around a tiny portable television in the vestibule to watch the Bulls' away game. There were others scattered around the pews, many of whom were poorly dressed, and seemed to have come in simply to get out of the cold.

The air smelled of lemon polish, wet wool, and every pot luck supper that had ever been held in the basement. The elegant carving on the pews and the scuffed floor indicated that Mt. Moriah had been around for a long time. Up in front, the choir members sorted themselves according to voice, and the piano led them through warm-ups. Gary found a pew and sat--not in the front, not in the back, but solidly in the middle. Just like when he was a kid. His mom would have preferred to sit front and center, while his dad wanted to be in the last row so he could beat everyone else to the parking lot the minute the service was over. They'd compromised.

Thinking about his parents reminded him of the letter his mom had sent, which reminded him of his conversations with Marissa, which reminded him of the paper...and that was no good, was it? It certainly wasn't comfortable to think about, not in a place like this. Despite the amicable buzz of activity around him, this wasn't a mall food court. It was the kind of a place where people--and whoever else might be around--had...expectations.

Gary distracted himself by checking out some of the other stray souls. The pews were sprinkled with people praying, listening, or, maybe just thinking. An older couple in the back were reading a Bible, heads touching as they bent over the book between them. One woman, bundled in layers of clothing so thick that Gary had no idea what her true shape was, watched the choir in rapt fascination from a front pew, a bundle at her feet. At the end of the same pew an elderly man, frayed around the edges, swayed back and forth in time to the first song, something about moving up and praising God that included clapping and plenty of Alleluias. Gary would have to tell Marissa that they'd had an appreciative audience tonight.

Another woman, in a loose-fitting grey trench coat that was patched at the elbows with squares of blue gingham, was kneeling on the cold linoleum a few rows back from Gary, head bent, lips moving silently. She had dark hair, shoulder length, that hid most of her face, and she was fingering a rosary. Its silver cross and a few black beads were draped over her folded hands. Common sense would have declared her decidedly out of place in this Protestant church, but somehow she fit right in with the blend of socializing and spirituality, and no one seemed to mind her presence.

"You're Marissa's friend, aren't you?" The voice had come from just to his right, and Gary turned and found himself looking into a pair of kind brown eyes--the pastor of the church, he remembered from a couple of past visits.

"Yeah. Hi, Reverend." Hoping he'd used the right title, Gary stuck out his hand. He would have stood, but the minister motioned him to stay where he was, and joined him on the pew instead. "Gary Hobson," he added as they shook hands. "I--uh, I hope it's okay that I'm here."

"Reverend Nicks, and it's always okay, Gary. As you can see, our choir brings its own entourage with it, and nights like this, I try to keep the church doors unlocked as late as I can, even if there are no activities. But on choir nights we seem to get a few more." He nodded at the woman in the front row. "You've probably noticed this church is on a bit of a borderline, neighborhood-wise. We try to help whoever we can; it's part of the Lord's work."

Gary nodded, watching the woman across from him on her knees. Though the music had risen to a rousing, joyous conclusion, she'd buried her face in her hands. Reverend Nicks sighed.

"She's been in here every night for a week, and every once in a while before that, but she won't talk to me. No doubt she'd be more comfortable over at St. Bridgit's, but Father Cleary is getting on in years, and he worries about vandalism--locks the doors at sundown. That's usually when she wanders in. I wish I knew how to help her."

"Yeah." Gary knew that feeling all too well, and that reminded him--"Have you seen a couple of kids around here?" It was a long shot, especially considering how far this church was from Navy Pier, but Gary had to ask. "They're Hispanic, a girl and a boy..." But the Reverend shook his head at Gary's description.

"No, son, I'm afraid I haven't. Friends of yours?"

Gary rubbed his chin. "Not exactly. But I think they need some help."

"Then I hope you find them soon." Cocking his head, Reverend Nicks listened to the choir run through the end of the song one more time before he said, "Our Lord told us that not a sparrow falls without the Father's notice, but sometimes it is hard, to see so many falling here. We do our best to catch them when we can." He smiled, and the assurance in his eyes reminded Gary of the faith Marissa always seemed to have in the paper and its origins. "Sometimes I believe the Lord Himself needs a little help."

"Catching sparrows," Gary murmured.

"Indeed. Some of us are called to worldly greatness, but I believe there is also greatness to be found in the smallest acts of kindness." He stood, his mouth twisted into a rueful grin. "And I should do you the kindness of practicing my sermons solo, shouldn't I?"

"Oh, no, I--"

"No, no--it's true." Brushing invisible dust off the sleeve of his black jacket, Nicks grinned and winked at Gary. "I have a terrible habit of thinking my theology out loud, even in casual conversation. Certain members of my congregation think I'm getting in extra preaching, but really--I'm just as lost as anyone else much of the time."

He left Gary and went to sit next to the praying woman. Placing one hand on her shoulder, the Reverend sat, head bowed--praying with her, Gary decided. She started at his touch, but when she turned and saw who it was, she relaxed and went back to her rosary.

Reverend Nicks didn't look lost. He looked as if he knew exactly what he was doing, and as if that was exactly what he wanted and needed to do.

Gary watched the rest of the choir's rehearsal, but he couldn't have said what the songs were about, or even what faults Gail had managed to find with the singers. His mind was on choices and sparrows.

He didn't even realize the rehearsal was over until he heard Marissa call his name. Blinking out of his trance, he saw her standing a few yards away next to Gail, who was trying to bundle Chris into his coat. The kid didn't want to lift his thumbs off his Game Boy, so it wasn't exactly an easy struggle.

"Over here, Marissa," he called, gathering up their coats. All the cold-weather gear was cumbersome, and as he fumbled with the pile, the paper fell onto the seat, then slid off the polished wood onto the red carpet. When Marissa showed up at the end of the pew, he gave up the attempt to carry everything, concentrating instead on helping her on with her coat and untangling her hat, mittens, and scarf from his own.

Keyed up from the music, Marissa was bouncing on her toes and talking faster than usual. "I'm so glad I came--thanks, Gary--I mean, it's just been such a long day sitting inside the house, and I don't even mind the cold, do you? I can even smell it in here. It's amazing how the snow brings out the best in people. Mrs. Hayes didn't complain once about the tenors being off-key, like she does every week--though usually it's her that's off."

Gary had seen this adrenaline-enhanced version of Marissa once or twice, and usually it amused him. This time he had other matters on his mind. "Hey, uh, Chatty Cathy?" he asked, dropping his voice and handing over her mittens. "You didn't--you didn't put the good Reverend Nicks over there up to anything, did you?"

That brought her up short, and she stopped winding her scarf around her neck to ask, "What are you talking about?"

"He came over here to say hi and we ended up having a little talk--actually, Reverend Nicks did most of the talking." If he thought about it as Marissa's intervention, the whole conversation might make more sense. "You orchestrated the whole thing, didn't you?"

Marissa stood with her mouth agape for a moment, then protested, "Gary, I swear, I didn't say a word--I wouldn't--well, how in the world would I even begin to explain what's going on with you to someone who knows nothing about the paper? And I wouldn't presume to talk to anyone else about your problems like that, let alone 'orchestrate'--"

"Okay, okay." Gary held up a hand. "I, uh, plead temporary insanity. I believe you. It's just that it was strange, the way he came over and started talking about sparrows and stuff, after what we were talking about earlier, you know?"

"You discussed bird watching with my pastor?" The confusion on her face, what he could see of it between her beret and scarf, eliminated the last of his doubts.

"No, you know, sparrows, like in the Bible."

"You mean Matthew?--'Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? And yet not one of them falls to the ground without your Father's knowledge.'--those sparrows?"

"Not in so many words, but, yeah," Gary muttered, bending to retrieve the paper from the floor. Several pages had scattered, and he gathered them up, checking each one for any new developments.

"That's...wow, Gary, that's just like what we were talking about earlier. So what did he have to say about it all?"

Gary straightened up slowly, reading an article that hadn't been there before. A dumpster fire; it wasn't much, but considering the location, he was pretty sure he needed to be there. He zipped up his coat and offered his elbow to Marissa. "I can tell you along the way, if you don't mind a detour."

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	7. Chapter 7

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_Step on a crack._  
 _In a city of concrete it is impossible_  
 _to avoid disaster indefinitely..._  
 _Finally, you must choose between_  
 _standing still in the one solid spot you_  
 _have found, or you keep moving_  
 _and take the risk:_  
 _Break your mother's back._

~ Judith Ortiz Cofer

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After Gary had summarized his conversation with Reverend Nicks, he told Marissa about the article in the paper. For once, there was no need to keep their voices down; they were alone on the L. "It starts in a trash barrel and catches on some old crates and spreads--does minor damage to the kitchen. They think vagrants start the fire and then it gets out of control or something."

There was a pause, nearly a block rattled by, then Marissa asked, "You decided, didn't you? That's why there's something more in the paper."

Gary gaped at his friend, who sat next to him, facing the otherwise empty L car with an infuriatingly calm expression. Her matter-of-fact attitude about something so completely bizarre was going to make him nuts. "I didn't--it's not like I filled out some cosmic survey or something." Arms crossed over his chest, he slumped back against his seat. "This is just a stupid trash fire."

"Behind the same restaurant where you spent the afternoon partying with a bunch of--"

"I was not 'partying', I was buying lunch for some hungry, slightly whacked-out kids. I should have asked if they were friends of Patrick," he muttered.

Marissa would not be deterred. "If you ask me, there's a reason for this."

Gary grunted. "You always say that."

"And am I wrong?"

"No..."

"There's a 'but' in there somewhere," she said.

Gary acknowledged her echoing of his own earlier words with a half-laugh. "It's just that I was thinking, after I talked to Reverend Nicks--that choice you're talking about? I really did make it a long time ago. Maybe I just needed to be reminded that it was a good choice."

"And are you convinced, now?"

"Well, I--I guess so."

"You guess so? Isn't that why we're headed to the scene of a trash barrel fire?"

He was saved from having to answer as the L shrieked to a halt. "This is it." Refusing to acknowledge the faint, satisfied smile on Marissa's face, he led her off the train and down to the sidewalk.

The night was cold, much colder even than the day that had preceded it. The wind had died down, leaving Chicago shrouded in the stillness that only came in deep winter. The clear air was so sharp that deep breaths hurt, and small sounds--car doors, footsteps, and even the click of a traffic light changing--rang with piercing clarity. Once again Gary tramped through the barely-plowed streets, a half-step ahead of Marissa as he tried to steer her along the clearest path.

The lights were still on in Luigi's, and from the looks of things, the party had not only continued, but grown. Young people were crowded at the tables, and voices and laughter could be heard even through the walls. Gary thought for a second or so about going in and getting help, then dismissed the idea. This was just a small fire, after all; at least it would be if he could get there in the next couple minutes. He was pretty sure that in the time it would take him to convince the owner to find an extinguisher--if he even had one--the blaze would already have spread to the kitchen.

"C'mon." Tugging Marissa's hand, he led her around the corner and down the darkened alley, lit by the lone streetlight behind them and a few flickering flames halfway down the narrow passage. The drifts here weren't as deep as they'd been out on the sidewalks and streets. The buildings that framed the alley had blocked the snow from accumulating too much, which might explain why a homeless person would try to shelter here. The thing was, there were no people around that Gary could see--just the barrel, snow-covered drifts of trash against the brick buildings, and haphazard jumbles of wooden crates on both sides of Luigi's back entrance. In the faint light cast by the flames he noted the bare, broken bulb that hung over the dented wooden door.

"I can smell it the fire--can you see it?" Marissa asked as they approached the barrel.

"It's right here," he told her, releasing her with a gentle shove toward the relative safety of the opposite side of the alley. "Hold on." He tried to haul the barrel away from the empty wooden crates stacked next to Luigi's back door, but the metal was already too hot, even through his gloves. Whatever was burning in there was popping and crackling like a bowl of Rice Krispies on steroids, and sparks and embers were shooting out into the alley. Gary looked around for something to smother the fire, and, finding nothing else, he started scooping snow from the small drifts along the opposite building into the barrel. Sparks kept landing at his feet, and he stomped at them, all the while trying to keep an eye on the stacks of wooden crates.

"Move down to your left," he called to Marissa, hoping he was directing her out of reach of the flying embers.

She sidled a few yards down the alley, keeping one hand on the wall of the building for guidance. "Can I help?"

"Nah, I've almost got it." Gary reached for another armload of snow. The only problem with putting out the main fire was that doing so cut down on what he could see. There were no more flames leaping past the barrel's rim, and the popping was settling down, too, but he could still hear a crackle--and it wasn't coming from the barrel.

Peering at the maze of ancient, dried out wood and rusting nails, Gary finally saw it--a board at the top of the pile that had caught fire and was about to send fingers of flame to the rest of the crates. Snow wouldn't do the trick this time. He whipped off his coat and beat at the boards with it, once, twice, and then a third time; but he underestimated his strength and overestimated the stability of the pile. It toppled toward him and Gary fell backward. The crates crashed to the ground and he rolled into the opposite wall.

"Gary? What happened, are you okay?"

Before he could draw breath to answer, there was a second crash--the pile of crates on the other side of the door came tumbling down, and quick footsteps echoed at the dark end of the alley.

Quick, light footsteps...the sound set off warning bells in his brain, but for a moment--just a small, dark moment--Gary stayed where he was, clutching his coat to his chest, letting his heart pound, trying to wish away the cold and the nagging pain in his knees and elbows. Then he decided that he'd spent quite enough time lying in alleyways for one day, and with a muffled groan, he pushed himself to his feet.

The ground around him was littered with splintered boards and the contents of the trash barrel, which had been upended by the falling tower of crates. Luckily, the snow that Gary had dumped in there had melted and all that threatened the alley now was a pile of soggy muck. His boots sloshed through it as he tried to make his way in the dark. "Marissa?"

"Here." She was pressed up against the wall, and he had to negotiate his way through the debris to get to her. When he finally got past the worst of the second pile, he could make out little more of her outline than he'd been able to from ten yards away.

"You okay?"

"Yes." She turned her face toward the end of the alley. "There was someone here."

"Behind a stack of crates; that was the second crash you heard."

"Not just heard, I felt it, Gary. I was trying to get to you and then when that stuff came tumbling down I think I jumped back six feet. Whoever it was brushed past me on the way out, and it sounded--and felt--like--"

"Kids?"

She nodded. "It sounded like a couple of them, or else very small adults. You saw them?"

"It's so dark back here I can barely see you. But I can hear footsteps too, you know."

Marissa reached for his arm; when she touched his sweater, she drew her hand back. "Put your coat on; you're going to freeze."

He was sweating from exertion and being so close to the fire, but obeyed anyway. "Marissa, you don't think those kids--I mean, they couldn't have been--"

"Anything's possible."

She seemed to be waiting for him to make a decision, but for the life of him, he didn't know what he could do. It was too dark, and whoever had set the fire and knocked over the crates had too much of a head start for there to be any reasonable chance of finding them. "Let's go home. I think I've had enough for one day."

Just in case, though, Gary took the opposite way out of the alley, emerging near the park where Jeff's sculptures still stood, transformed by the moon and a couple of streetlights into ghostly monoliths. He slowed as they passed the entrance, and Marissa tilted her head to one side. "What is it?"

"Oh, nothing, it's just that guy, the one I met earlier--this is the park where he did those sculptures." It was late and cold, he should have moved on, but his feet wouldn't go. "It's driving me nuts, Marissa; I swear I've been here before, but I can't remember when."

"Did you save someone here?" she asked. They had slowed to a halt at the park gate.

"That's what I thought, but I sure can't remember what it would have been." He shrugged. "Oh well. I suppose we better get home."

"Wait, Gary. Do you think I--I mean, would your friend mind if I got to know his sculptures?"

It took Gary a minute, but he got it. "Oh. No, I'm sure he wouldn't. C'mere." He led her through the gate and onto the playground, guiding her hand to the head of a giant frog. "There're its eyes, and the legs, the flippers..." Marissa was kneeling in the snow, grinning as she felt the icy outlines through her mittens. Next Gary brought her to the troll, and then the robot. She gave him her cane so she could kneel next to the sculpture, totally absorbed in exploring its lines with her hands. It was cold, bitterly so, and the temperature was dropping quickly, but they were both having a strange brand of fun, the kind of opportunity that rarely presented itself. Gary was just reaching for her hand to help her stand when a sharp crack shattered the still air.

Then a scream, high-pitched and terrified.

Marissa's grip tightened around his fingers. "Oh my God. That came from--" She was already on her feet, turning toward the trees. Gary didn't waste any time agreeing, just tugged at her hand, dragging her along with him as he ran for the pond he'd remembered, thinking about what Jeff had said about the kids playing hockey earlier, and mentally kicking himself for not looking at the paper after the fire.

"Gary, what's happening?" Marissa was breathless, and he knew she was hard-pressed to stay on her feet as he pulled her down the slim footpath among the trees. She grabbed onto his upper arm with her free hand, her fingers digging into the nylon and soft down of his parka.

It was impossible, though, for Gary to slow down, not after that scream. "Tree," he warned as he yanked her away from a potential collision with the trunk of an evergreen. All the while, a thought nagged at his brain--he knew this trail, it had been here for decades, he *knew* that, but how? "There's a pond back here; Jeff said there were kids earlier."

"At this time of night?"

"You said it was kids in the alley." Gary skidded to a halt, Marissa bumping into him from behind, as they broke from the cover of trees.

There was, indeed, a pond, no more than a hundred feet in rough, misshapen diameter. Piles of snow dotted the perimeter, a couple of nearby benches had been dusted off, and the surface of the pond had indeed been cleared for skating. It was smooth as glass--except for the star-shaped opening in the middle and the small shadow crawling toward it.

The shadow was sobbing, reaching for the opening, long hair dragging on the ice...

Recognition hit like an avalanche, and with a gasp that drew icy knives into his lungs, Gary shouted, "Lucy!"

Marissa gasped in his ear. The shadow stopped; the girl looked back at him, but only for a moment, and then she was crawling toward the hole again.

"Lucy, no! Stop!"

Still clutching Marissa's hand, Gary maneuvered them both over the snow piles and onto the first ring of ice, which felt solid enough beneath his feet, but Gary knew better. He hadn't grown up in northern Indiana and spent winters camping with his dad without hearing all the warnings about thin ice.

"Stay here," he told Marissa, and took a few steps farther onto the ice. It held, but Lucy was yards ahead of him, nearly to the dark opening. It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out what had happened.

"Lucy, you gotta stop. Stop! We'll get your brother."

Up ahead of him, the ice cracked again, and even though it held, Gary dropped to his knees, then all the way down.

 _If the ice starts to give, get down_ , his dad had told him when he'd gone after a puck that had slid far out onto the lake. _You have to spread out your weight. Use as much of the ice to support yourself as you can._

He was close enough now to hear splashing from the opening in the ice over Lucy's incoherent sobs, and he thought he saw a dark head break the surface of the frigid water. Flat on his stomach, he crawled toward them, closer, closer, but not close enough, not fast enough. Lucy, too, was lying prone on the ice, reaching for the open water, inching closer to the hole as she tried to grasp a pair of tiny, flailing hands.

Gary scooted forward as quickly as he dared. He was within an arm's length of Lucy's ankle when she moved again, too far and too fast. The ice gave way beneath her with another sickening crack and she disappeared.

"No!"

The water before him churned as both children panicked and fought to escape.

"Gary, what is it? Gary!"

He had to get to them, but he knew the ice wouldn't support his weight for long. Over the splashing and screaming, he shouted instructions and stripped off his gloves. "Marissa, I need you to crawl out here. Don't walk, it isn't safe, you have to get down. Straight ahead, grab my ankles, can you do that? To your left--that's it." He thought that maybe if he could extend his reach, redistribute his weight, there'd be a better chance for all of them. Though it seemed like hours, it was only a few seconds before he felt Marissa's hands lock around his legs, right above his boots, and he dared to inch closer to the opening, just a few feet in front of him now.

"What are we doing, Gary? Where are the kids?"

"In the water. Just hold on, okay? I'm almost there."

It seemed to Gary that he could feel the ice beneath him getting thinner as he scooted forward with Marissa in tow, the spiderweb of cracks before him spreading, threatening to open into a gaping maw that would put both of them in the frigid water with the kids. He was close enough now to spread his fingers over the edge of the opening, but he couldn't reach anything solid.

"Lucy, c'mon! Bernardo--somebody get my hand!"

He could see movement, that was the frustrating thing. Throwing caution to the wind, he pulled himself forward a foot more, then another, plunged his arms into the water, dragging Marissa behind, hoping he wouldn't regret this..."Gotcha!"

What he had was the shoulder of a soaking-wet sweatshirt. It was enough to yank Bernardo's head above the water. With his other hand, he got a grip under the little boy's arm and hauled him up and to the side, using a burst of adrenaline to toss him like a wet pillow so that he slid to thicker ice, to safety. Gary turned back--and the water was still.

"Lucy! Lucy, c'mon, where are you?" Pawing through the water with hands that had gone numb, Gary tried futilely to locate a wrist, hair, a coat, a shoe, anything. Behind him, he could her the little boy sobbing--thank God he was breathing--and he could feel Marissa, tugging the hems of his jeans, and then the ice splintered again, the vibration resonating through Gary's chest. It was all going to give way, they'd both go in--

"Marissa, let go!"

"No! Gary, you can't--"

"Let go and back up! Get the boy off the ice."

She released his ankles only long enough to readjust her grip, to wrap both arms around his legs.

"Damn it, Marissa!"

The ice under Gary's ribs gave way.

He fell down into the water, head first, arms outstretched. He opened his mouth in shock and cold rushed in, hitting every nerve in his throat, his sinuses, his brain. Around him the water was black and cold, colder than he'd even known cold could be, so cold it burned through every cell in his hands, his face, his neck. Hell had frozen over, and he was falling into it.

But he didn't fall far. Instead, he hung from the waist, the upper half of his body in the water, and he realized that the ice under his legs still held. It was thicker there, and Marissa hadn't let go. Some part of his brain, through the stabbing cold, felt her tugging his ankles; he was being dragged backward, through the water and out toward solidity, and with that movement, his outstretched hand bumped against something in the water--an arm.

He grabbed it more tightly than he would have if it had been a life preserver. With every ounce of warmth and awareness left in his body, he commanded his frozen muscles to move, and he lifted himself and then Lucy up through the water, breaking the surface as Marissa pulled on his legs. They, too, were able to work even though he couldn't feel them, and somehow they were all moving back, away from the danger. He heard Lucy coughing and choking even before they were clear of the hole. He kept the girl locked in his frozen grip as they all slid back, until he was sure it was safe to sit up.

"Gary?" Marissa was on her knees, reaching out--her mittens were gone, Gary realized when her fingers brushed his face, ice touching frozen ice. "My God, Gary..."

"It's okay," he choked out, the new air in his lungs still unbelievably sharp.

He pulled Lucy into his lap. She leaned, limp and exhausted, against his chest, for just a moment, then the air seemed to register on both their wet bodies at the same time, for they began shivering in violent unison. Lucy sat up, coughing, wide-eyed.

"Nardo?"

"He's okay," Gary told her. By now they were both shaking so badly it might as well have been an earthquake. Marissa got to her feet and moved in the direction of the little boy's broken sobs, and Gary saw that he was curled into a tight ball. "Over there." He pointed, and as soon as Lucy saw her brother, she wrenched herself free of his grip, stumbling awkwardly past Marissa and sliding the last few feet on her knees to wrap her brother in her own wet arms.

Gary knew if he didn't move, he'd freeze right to the spot, turn into one of Jeff's sculptures. He pushed himself to his knees, then his feet, staggering into Marissa.

"Whoa." She reached up to steady him, grasping his upper arm, but though he could see her hand, he couldn't feel a thing. "Are the kids all right?"

"They're alive, they're--yeah." Gary struggled with another bout of coughing as his lungs fought against the knife-like air. The violent trembling resumed as his body tried to create its own heat.

"We have to get you all warm and dry, Gary, right now," Marissa insisted, some of the earlier panic still in her voice.

"You're shaking, too," he noted.

"No, that's you."

Maybe it was, but Marissa didn't look all that great herself--the front of her coat was wet, her hair was a dripping mess, and her hat was long gone.

"Marissa," he began, tentative but incredibly grateful, "if you hadn't--"

"Don't, Gary. I don't want to think about what could have happened."

"Yeah, well, thanks for not listening to me." Gary took her elbow and led her to the two children, huddled together and shaking, too cold, this time, to run away.

"Lucy," he said softly, "let's go get warm." The two trembling kids stared up at him. Lucy's anxious gaze darted between Gary and Marissa, but she didn't move.

He crouched down, holding out a hand. "Look, my name's Gary, okay? This is my friend Marissa, and we're not going to hurt you. We just want to help. You can't stay out here, Lucy, you know that." He could barely force his frozen jaw to work the words out.

Bernardo twisted in Lucy's arms and whispered something into her ear. "No," she said, shaking her head. "No."

"Lucy, take a good look at your brother," said Marissa. She was struggling out of her coat. "He's freezing, and so are you. You cannot stay here another minute, or you will both freeze to death. Now let's go." She held out her coat, and Lucy hesitated only a moment more before she stood, pulling Bernardo up with her, and walked over to take the coat. She would have put it around her little brother, but Gary reached down and picked him up, enveloping the boy in his frozen arms and hoping a little body heat would do them both some good. Lucy watched him with narrowed eyes as she wrapped Marissa's coat around herself. She started and stared when Marissa held out her hand.

"You'll have to help me, Lucy. I think my cane is out in the park, and it sounds as if Gary has his hands full." Gary watched in surprise as Lucy scanned Marissa's face, understanding dawning on her own. She laced her fingers through Marissa's, then leaned against her side for a split second before starting across what was left of the ice and through the trees. Bernardo had Gary's neck in a stranglehold and his legs around his waist, so, not quite steady under the burden, Gary followed Lucy and Marissa down the footpath.

The little group tromped through the trees and onto the playground, Gary-half blind between the head of wet black hair in his face and the mind-numbing cold. His limbs didn't seem to want to obey his brain, and more than once he tottered off the path. Once he stumbled into a tree and got turned around; found himself facing the way they'd come and was sure, yet again, that he'd seen that pond before. There had been a big log on one of the rocks, hadn't there?

"Gary? Where were we out here? Where's my cane?"

He turned himself around and followed Marissa's voice to the playground, guiding her and Lucy to the snow sculpture they'd been exploring when they'd heard the kids. When Lucy bent to retrieve the cane, the street light caught icicles in her hair. Gary saw them through the veil of ice on his own lashes. Bernardo was making small whimpering sounds against his neck, his breath creating the only warm spot on Gary's body.

"...and you have to go first, because you're the only one who knows where we're going."

Gary blinked. Why was the snow robot talking to him?

"Gary?"

Now the robot was waddling back and forth and back and forth, doing a quick, stiff robot snow dance.

"Gary! Please answer me. Say something. You have to _move_."

He blinked again, and the robot was just a weird snow sculpture. Marissa was shaking his shoulder, alarmed at his failure to respond.

"It's okay, I know what I'm doing."

...was what he meant to say.

Thanks to his frozen jaw, what actually came out was, "O'ay, mow wha mooing."

Marissa was practically shouting now. "Gary, if you don't move, if we don't get somewhere warm _now_ , these kids are going to be in real trouble, and so are you. Where was that restaurant?"

Kids. Bernardo was dead weight against his chest. Lucy, nearly lost in the long wool coat, was clutching Marissa's hand and staring at Gary and her brother with scared, bewildered eyes. Focus, Hobson, he told himself. One foot in front of the other.

Just like the Winter Warlock in that old Christmas special.

"Gorra hurry," he mumbled, alarmed at the image of a dancing white warlock marionette appearing in his head. Where had _that_ come from? He managed to move, one foot, then the other.

"Yes, we have to hurry," Marissa agreed through chattering teeth. "You go first, and Lucy can help me." She stuck close through the playground and onto the street, one hand on Gary's elbow. But he only knew that it was there because he could look down and see it. He couldn't actually feel it. He had never, never in his life, been so cold. If he were to knock his head against a wall, his frozen hair would shatter and leave him bald.

Marissa was talking to him, to all of them, and he knew, in some part of his brain that the ice water hadn't reached, that she was trying her best to keep them all focused, grounded, and aware. But her words got caught in the cloudy vapor of her breath, splintering into shards of ice around his ears. He couldn't connect with them; couldn't form a response for all the noise swirling through his own brain.

Luigi's, he thought. It was just a block or so away. Put one foot in front of the other.

"It's okay Lucy," Marissa soothed. "We'll be warm soon."

Soon you'll be walking 'cross the floor.

"We'll get you some dry clothes, too, and something to eat. Do you like hot chocolate?"

Did Winter Warlocks drink hot chocolate? Or would it melt them from the inside out?

He would welcome melting at this point. He would be happy to be a puddle of goo on the floor, as long as it was a warm floor and he could be warm goo.

Two buildings down, the lighted doorway shone like a homing beacon. "'Mos'ere," he told Marissa.

"Almost there?"

He stopped, nodded. "Here." But he couldn't make his hand reach the doorknob. He couldn't force it from the sniffling form wrapped around his neck, his chest, his torso. He and Bernardo were going to be Siamese twins, frozen like this, together forever.

It was Lucy who opened the door, looking up at Gary with a question in her eyes and waiting for his stiff nod of confirmation before she turned the knob.

Out of the restaurant rushed a tornado of light and sound that left Gary's numb senses reeling. Somehow he was moving, but he wasn't sure it was under his own power. Other hands peeled Bernardo from his arms and he tried to explain what had happened, to ask for help, to tell the indiscriminate forms before him to look out for the kids, to get them warm, but the words wouldn't come out. He left explanations to Marissa while the colors and the light and the words and the warmth, warmth, warmth engulfed him and he just let it all happen, losing track of the reality swirling around him, no longer caring if he ever put one foot in front of the other again.

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	8. Chapter 8

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_snow, rain, storms can help--_  
 _birds in their one-room family nests_  
 _shaken by winds cruel and crazy--_  
 _they can all help;_  
 _lock not away your love and keep it hid._

~ Carl Sandburg

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Gary came to his senses--minutes later or more, he wasn't sure--in the same grungy rest room in which he'd cleaned up earlier in the day. In his hands were a Northwestern sweatshirt and a pair of too-short sweatpants--holey, sure, but they were dry holes. There was a towel, too, rough and scratchy against his skin, which ached and stung as it thawed out. It didn't matter--anything was better than the numbness. Warm water filled the sink, and Gary splashed some on his face, dried it and his hair, shivered into the clothes as best he could--and socks, thick grey woolen socks. Whoever had found him those socks was going to be blessed for life. He would call Reverend Nicks tomorrow and make sure of that.

Someone knocked at the door. "Gary? You okay?"

It was Jeff, who watched with concern as Gary opened the door and walked out of the wash room, blinking in the dingy, candlelit dining area. He turned back for his wet things, but Jeff pushed him away. "I'll get it, man. Luigi's putting everything in his dryer upstairs. Go sit, get something hot inside you."

Gary made his way through the room, which seemed to be full of people, at least compared to this afternoon. All of them were young, arty-looking types, and almost all of them were staring at him. After a moment's hesitation, he picked out Rob's streaked head above the rest of the small crowd, at a table in the far corner, hoping he'd find everyone there. He tried to ignore the looks he was getting as he padded toward the table in stockinged feet and sweatpants that stopped mid-calf. As he dodged the waving arms of a girl in gothic makeup who seemed to be performing some kind of chair dance to electronic music blaring from a boom box, Gary saw that he'd guessed correctly. His chair tipped back against the wall, Rob had one arm draped around a still-spacey Trini, and across from them sat Marissa, Bernardo huddled in her lap. The little boy's legs were curled up inside a Bears sweatshirt, the long arms of the shirt stretching far past his hands. Just as he had on the ice, he'd made himself into a tight, defensive ball. Marissa had both arms wrapped around the shivering kid, and Luke was next to her, trying to entice Bernardo to drink from the steaming mug he proffered.

"Come on, little guy. It's really good stuff, I promise. Look!" Luke himself took a sip, making a huge production of smacking his lips and rolling his eyes in pleasure. "Yummmm!"

To everyone's surprise, Bernardo giggled, the first sign of anything other than fear Gary had ever seen from the boy. When Luke held the mug under his nose, Bernardo unclutched from the ball he'd become, bunched up the arms of the sweatshirt until his hands were free, and reached for it. He retreated back into his cocoon immediately, hands clutched around the prize, but he was more animated, his dark eyes watching the strangers around him with more interest now than fear. When his gaze landed on Gary, he flashed a small, quick smile.

Then Luke noticed Gary and stood, waving him to the chair next to Marissa's. "Hey," he said by way of greeting, "you gonna be okay?"

"I'm fine." Gary eased down into the chair, his limbs still stiff. "I'm just never going to be warm again."

"Dude, you were totally out of it when you walked in here." Luke turned to the table and poured another mug of hot chocolate from a cracked ceramic pitcher.

"Yeah, well, I was a little numb." Gary wrapped his fingers around the mug Luke handed over, wishing he could just crawl into it. His skin was nothing but goose bumps.

"You scared me, Gary," Marissa told him quietly, shifting Bernardo as she turned toward her friend. "I didn't know if you were hurt or...or what."

"It was just the cold. I'm okay now." Gary took a long draught of the cocoa. "Where's Lucy?"

"She's in the ladies' room changing." Marissa smoothed Bernardo's damp hair in a maternal gesture, evidently as comfortable with the kid on her lap as he was with her. "Don't worry, she's not going anywhere without her brother."

"Yeah, I got that much. Where'd the clothes come from?" he asked Jeff, who pulled a chair next to his and plopped down.

"Well, a couple of us had the sweatshirts." Gary realized now that some of the restaurant's denizens were wearing one layer less than they had been earlier in the day. "Plus, Luigi lives upstairs. You must have really made an impression this afternoon, 'cause he let us raid his closet." Jeff shook his head. "Man, you make a habit out of this Batman routine, or what? Your friend told us what happened at the park."

"Right time, right place, I guess." Gary shrugged and held out his mug to Luke, who was leaning against the table, for a refill.

Rob peered around his friend to stare at Gary incredulously. "Right time, right place? At this time of night? On this _kind_ of night?"

"Well..." This time, Gary realized, his old excuse was actually true. "Yeah." Marissa rolled her eyes.

"You give him hot cocoa, sì?" Luigi had made his way to their table, carrying a tray of...geez, Gary thought, when was the last time he'd had cinnamon toast?

"Sì," Luke, Jeff, and Rob responded in unison.

"No!" Luigi deposited his tray on their table and turned to Gary with a conspiratorial wink. He reached into the large front pocket of the apron that sagged around his generous stomach and produced a bottle--no, a flask, Gary realized--which he unscrewed and tipped into Gary's mug in one smooth motion. "Much better," he declared as he recapped the bottle. He pounded Gary on the shoulder a couple of times, then headed back for the kitchen. "Sì, much better."

"Ah, I'd be careful about that," Jeff advised as Gary raised the cup to his lips. "Never know with Luigi."

Gary sniffed at the contents. "It's just schnapps," he pronounced, deciding, as the peppermint warmth spread down his gullet and out to the rest of his body, that it was a damn fine addition to one of his favorite childhood treats.

The music from the boom box changed; now it was a boisterous techno-rap thing. The rest of Luigi's patrons had stopped paying attention; the novelty of the wet strangers had worn off and they went back to talking, arguing, scribbling on napkins, and yes, chair dancing. Mimicking the goth girl's waving arms, Luke was still making faces at Bernardo, who was grinning wider and wider. Finally the kid burst into laughter, so hard and sudden that he sloshed hot chocolate out of his mug and onto Marissa's sleeve. Not having a clue that it was coming, she jumped and gasped when she felt the liquid on her arm and hand. Bernardo froze, the light of his smile disappearing as quickly as it had come. He squeezed his eyes shut and shook just a little, and didn't uncurl his fingers when Gary reached over and pried the mug away.

"Hey." Gary set the mug on the table and handed Marissa a napkin. "Hey, Bernardo, it's okay, look, we're gonna clean it up, see?" He had no idea if the boy could understand him, but he tried to make his voice as friendly and encouraging as possible.

Marissa tightened one arm around Bernardo and kissed the top of his head. "It's just a little cocoa. It's okay." She dabbed up the spill, then tossed the damp napkin in the general direction of the table. "All done. Nobody's angry at you. It's all right."

Bernardo unsqueezed his eyes and stared up at her face, then at the stain on her arm, then at Gary, who forced a smile past the dark thoughts that had resurfaced...these were kids who were used to being in trouble, used to being yelled at, maybe even used to being hurt. This boy was only...what, four? and he expected to be punished for spilling cocoa.

"It's okay buddy. You want some more?" Gary held the mug out, but Bernardo shook his head, and pulled back into the shelter of Marissa's arms. She let him cuddle down, rubbing his arm a little, reassuring him, while Gary sat back in his chair. Eyes wide, Luke looked at Gary, then at Jeff, and some sort of confirmation passed between the three of them. Jeff mouthed a word that a little kid like Bernardo shouldn't hear.

Gary nodded and opened his mouth to respond, but stopped when he caught movement out of the corner of his eye. In the doorway of the ladies' room, framed by the light, Lucy stood watching their group. Like Gary and Bernardo, she was wearing salvaged clothes. A dark green sweater that would have been oversized on a grown man--probably Luigi's, Gary decided--hung down to her knees, and grey woolen socks like the ones Gary wore covered her feet and the rest of her legs. Her laser gaze honed in on her brother and stayed there, but even when Gary motioned her over, she didn't move through the small but boisterous crowd. He could understand her reluctance to cross through all that, so he got up and walked over to her.

"Hey, Lucy. You want something to eat? Something warm?" He tried to keep his voice casual, as if this were the most natural thing in the world, as if nothing that had just happened had happened. The truth was, the girl made him nervous. He didn't know if she was going to bolt again--though he hoped she was smarter than that--and he didn't know how to begin breaking down her walls.

Lucy looked from Gary to the gauntlet of eyes and noise that she'd have to cross to get to her brother, and, evidently deciding that Gary was the lesser of the two evils, nodded. He reached for her shoulder, but she side-stepped his hand, staying close as they wove their way across the room, but making it clear that she did not want to be touched.

Luke pulled over another chair for her, and finally, her gaze still darting from one strange adult to another, Lucy sat down between Gary and Marissa. She stared at Bernardo with hungry eyes--whether she wanted to hold the boy herself or to be held, Gary wasn't sure. When Jeff handed her a mug of the cocoa, she took it, but sat staring into it, not drinking, not even blinking. Placing a hand on her shoulder, Gary spoke her name softly; she jumped, starting and staring at the others. Gary cleared his throat. Luke and Jeff took the hint and moved to the other side of the table, engaging in huddled conversation with Rob and Trini, and Lucy's shoulders dropped, relaxing just a little under Gary's hand.

"You were really brave to try and rescue your brother like that," he told her quietly.

Lucy shook her head. "It was my fault. I was looking at the statues. I should have been watching him. He got away from me and--"

"And you went after him. That was the brave part," Marissa assured her.

Lucy stared at Marissa, then at Gary, and he saw, in that moment, just how lost she was, and how much she wanted to trust them. But the moment flashed through her eyes and was gone; the walls went right back up with her next words. "Diego sent you, didn't he?" Her whisper held equal measures of fear and defiance.

"Who?"

"He sent you, that's why you're following us. Well, we're not going back!" Her voice rose, her chin tilted up, and her eyes met Gary's with a fierce desperation well beyond her age as she shrugged his hand away. "I don't care what you do, I don't care what he told you. We're not going back there _ever_."

"Lucy honey, I swear, I don't know anybody named Diego." Gary turned both hands, palms up, in her direction, as if to demonstrate his lack of complicity in whatever nightmare she was running from. "I wasn't following you; it wasn't like that at all."

Marissa raised one eyebrow at that, but she didn't say anything. Okay, so maybe Gary had been following them, or at least he had wanted to, but it wasn't with the intentions Lucy was ascribing to him.

"Yes you were! You were in the alley. I may be a kid, but I'm not stupid."

"No, you're not stupid at all," Gary assured her, and decided he'd better try another tack. "I only want to help you guys, and I promise, you won't have to go back anywhere that's not--that's not safe." A foolish promise, maybe, but Gary was going to do whatever he could to make it true. "But if we're gonna help, you have to tell us what's going on. Where are your parents?" He was taking a chance that Diego wasn't one of the parents, but he figured Lucy wouldn't call her father by his first name. Lucy shot him another withering glare and then clammed up, tilting her head forward so that her hair covered her face again.

"Sweetheart," Marissa said gently when Lucy didn't answer Gary's question, "nobody here wants to see you get hurt. We won't let that happen. But someone somewhere has to be pretty worried about you both. We want to help."

"Look, I know taking care of your brother is a big responsibility," Gary added. Maybe if he talked to her like an adult, she'd respond. "And you--you've done a great job so far, you really have. Better than most people would. But what we're trying to tell you is that you don't have to do it alone, not any more. You've got friends here, people who want to help. You know me, and now you know Marissa, that's two people. And then there's these guys--" He waved a hand at the group across the table. "Jeff and Luke and Rob and Trini. They're okay, too, even though the guys are kinda goofy-looking." Lucy looked up at that, and, proving that they weren't really being as discreet as they'd tried to seem, the three all pulled silly faces, sticking out tongues and rolling eyes. Lucy ducked her head again, but this time Gary thought that maybe it was to hide a smile.

After a moment of further hesitation, she whispered, "We only wanted to get warm."

Gary frowned, perplexed, and bent his head closer to hers, trying to get a good look at her face through the veil of damp black strands. "What are you talking about?"

"The fire. I didn't mean to make it so big. I'm sorry." Lucy's knuckles turned pale as she gripped the mug.

"You mean the fire in the barrel? It was no big deal," Gary told her. "No big deal at all. You just needed a little help to put it out."

"I don't need any help!" Now she did look at him, tossing her hair back over her shoulder, and her eyes flashed more sparks than the fire she'd set. "It was just fine until you came along and messed everything up!"

The outburst brought activity in the room to a halt for just a moment. Bernardo's eyes were huge as he stared at his sister, but whether he was afraid of her or for her, Gary wasn't sure.

Gary opened his mouth to point out just who had messed things up, but snapped it shut when he realized that he really didn't know, and that Lucy had lashed out only because she was scared, and not in control. Instead he took a deep breath, then pointed with two fingers to her mug and told her, "You should drink that before it gets cold, ya know. It's good stuff, and there's plenty more. Want some toast?" He reached for the platter on the table, but Lucy shook her head. Bernardo, however, leaned forward and snatched a piece of the thick crusty bread. Lucy shot him a betrayed look, but the boy was too happy licking butter and cinnamon sugar off the top of the bread to notice.

Gary sat back in his chair, at a loss for what to do next. The recalcitrant Lucy returned to glaring at her cocoa, and showed no sign of speaking. Bernardo didn't seem to know enough English to answer their questions, and he wasn't old enough in any case. Across the table, Jeff was watching all of them when he thought no one was paying attention, obviously wanting to help but not sure how to do it.

It was Trini, surprisingly enough, who finally broke the stalemate. As far as Gary had noticed, she'd been as out of it through the preceding scene as she'd been that afternoon. Now, though, she rose without a word to anyone, walked around the table, and stopped behind Lucy's chair.

"God, you've got great hair," she murmured, like a bad imitation of a shampoo commercial, but her voice wasn't as flat and lifeless as it had been the last time Gary had heard it. Lucy blinked, but didn't look up, and Trini reached out, hands tentative, then more confident, as she touched, then stroked, the dark, sleek hair.

Gary wasn't sure if he should allow this, if it would set off another explosion, but when Lucy didn't shrug the older girl away, he relaxed a little. Marissa was still, listening, taking it in, and Gary knew that if she sensed a problem, she'd say something.

Trini's hands seemed to have a purpose of their own, for while her face still had that just-arrived-from-Pluto detachment, her fingers got busy, not just touching, but moving through the damp strands, finger combing, first slowly, then with more speed and confidence. Humming softly to herself, she bent her fingers into hooks, weaving and twisting black locks into some kind of braid that lifted the hair up and away from Lucy's face, revealing high, sharp cheekbones and then soft, rounded ears.

Lucy had gone very still, more like a statue than before, and yet as Gary watched, her anger and defensiveness seemed to ebb away. Or maybe it was just that he could actually see her face now, see how young and how scared she really was. Trini soon had all of the hair plaited back from Lucy's face and was weaving the long expanse that hung down the girl's back into one tight braid. Gary, who'd earned his knot-tying merit badge when he was only ten, couldn't for the life of him figure out how she was doing it, still humming under her breath, still seemingly unaware that she was doing anything at all.

His attention was diverted from Trini's methodical fingers when he chanced another glance at Lucy's face. She remained unmoving, her feet tucked behind the front rail of her chair, but a tear was rolling down her face. It was a tear, wasn't it, and not a drip from her hair? But no, another one dropped from her eye, splashing silently into the cocoa. Gary was just reaching for the mug when Trini somehow tucked the ends of Lucy's hair in on themselves, securing the braid, and patted the girl lightly on the head. "You know, my mom always used to braid my hair. I loved it when she did that."

At that, Lucy gave a great, hiccuping sob; her hands flew to her face and Gary grabbed the mug just in time.

Trini jumped back, shocked. "What'd I do?"

Gary set the mug on the table. "I think you did the right thing," he told her. Lucy was crying in earnest now, shoulders heaving, elbows on her knees, face buried in her hands.

Bernardo reached out from his perch on Marissa's lap and patted his sister on the shoulder with a sticky hand. "No llore, Lucy. Yo lo amo, no llora," he pleaded, his voice more fearful than comforting. "No cry, Lucy, stop, por favor."

She didn't stop, not even for her brother; she didn't even acknowledge him.

"It's all right, Bernardo, she needs to cry," Marissa soothed. Gary tended to agree with her. Bernardo turned his round, worried face from his sister to Marissa and back, then withdrew his hand.

Gary let the heartbroken sobs go on for as long as he could stand them, which wasn't long at all. He scooted his chair closer, reached over and placed one hand on Lucy's shoulder. Trini looked on helplessly, like she'd rather be anyplace else at the moment, and finally she shuffled back over to her chair next to Rob. The three young men had gone silent, watching the scene; even the boombox's venerators had stopped the music. Their attention made Gary uncomfortable, but Lucy was oblivious.

"Hey," he faltered, leaning close so she could hear him, "it's okay Lucy, really. It's okay. You're safe now. Bernardo's okay, you did good, you took care of your brother...Lucy, we'll find your mom, if that's what you want."

At that, she heaved another sob and tottered over, sideways and forward, burying her head in her arms on Gary's knees. For a moment all he could do was stare in surprise while hot tears soaked through the hole in the right knee of the old sweats. He glanced over at Marissa; Bernardo had retreated from his sister's pain and had turned his face into her sweater. Marissa rested her chin against the top of his head, blinking back tears of her own. Gary sighed, and rubbed Lucy's back between her shoulder blades.

"It's okay," he whispered over and over, while the girl's sobs subsided into intermittent hiccups, and then deep breaths that sent shudders through her whole body. Behind him conversations resumed, quieter now than they had been, but getting back to business now that the show was over. "It's gonna be all right." Lucy turned her face and settled her head on her folded arms, still resting on Gary's knees. Her lashes were damp, but her face had lost its tight, defensive lines, and soon her breathing became deep and even. In the midst of all the voices and banging dishes, she'd gone to sleep.

Marissa echoed Gary's sigh. "So much for a slow news day."

He looked up to see that Bernardo, too, had dropped off, one hand still clutching a bit of cinnamon toast.

They sat in silence for a while longer. Gary was afraid to move and wake Lucy; he knew that soon, very soon, they were going to have to talk about what to do, but right now just letting the kids sleep seemed like the best plan. He settled for sipping at his own cocoa and staring at the travel poster across from him, a tattered picture of the Coliseum.

After fifteen minutes or so, Luigi emerged from the kitchen with a neatly-folded pile of their clothing, plus a grocery sack. "Here is stuff," he said proudly. Everything was dry, except for Gary's thick parka, which probably would be damp until spring. "Wallet in bag, other stuff, too. Kids' stuff. But newspaper--all wet, no good. I throw away, okay?"

Marissa choked on a chuckle, and Gary smiled the ghost of a grin, still circling his hand over Lucy's back. "It's fine, Luigi. Thanks." The round little man set the pile and sack on the table, clearing away the pitcher and mostly untouched tray of toast. He looked at Gary and Marissa, at Lucy and Bernardo, clucking his tongue. "Good kids," he said with a smile, and took the dishes back to the kitchen.

People were starting to leave; chairs scraped back, coats were zipping up, candles were gutting out. "It's gotta be close to midnight," Gary told Marissa. "What are we gonna do now?"

She leaned back in her chair, shifting the dead weight in her lap. Even in sleep, Bernardo seemed bent on making himself as small as possible; he remained curled in a tight knot, most of his body inside the huge sweatshirt. "I suppose in cases like this, you're supposed to call the police, or Child Services." But even as she said it, her arm tightened around the little boy.

"Oh, man..." Across the table, Jeff shook his head.

"What?" Gary asked.

"Look--" Jeff shifted in his chair and pointed with a half-full glass of wine, "it's not my place to say, you'll do what you gotta do, but--you stick those kids in the system, they may never get out."

Rob nodded in agreement. "My sister's a social worker. She was always kind of a bleeding heart. But now she has so many cases, she can't even keep up with the paperwork. Kids like that," he said, gesturing at Lucy, "kids who won't talk? They don't have time to pry it out of them. They'll just put them in a shelter or foster care and forget about them. It's like the Hotel California. You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave."

Frustrated, Gary ran a hand through his hair and blew out a sigh. It was possible that Lucy and Bernardo would be assigned to a case worker who'd move heaven and earth to put things right for them, but it wasn't likely, not in a city the size of Chicago. On the other hand--what else was there to do?

But he'd promised Lucy they'd be safe. She would see turning them over to more strangers as a betrayal, however well-intended the action might be.

"She'll run away again," Gary said softly, looking down at Lucy and knowing in his gut that he was right. If she did that, he didn't need the paper to predict her future. She was tough and smart, but she was far too young to get by on her own. And her clothes, that thin coat, coupled with her faint, lilting accent--wherever she'd come from, she wasn't used to a Chicago winter, that was for sure.

"Gary?" Marissa's soft voice startled him out of his speculation. "Why don't we take them to my place, just for tonight? It's fairly close, and it's too late to do anything right now anyway. Maybe in the morning we can figure something out."

The relief that Gary felt at this idea was probably, if he believed the rational part of his mind , ill-advised. They were just prolonging the inevitable, unless they could get Lucy to tell them more about her family and where they'd come from.

And yet, there was no way he was going to say no.

"Okay, well, we gotta..." He trailed off, a shiver running through his body as he stared at the darkness beyond the windows. The thought of tramping back to the L through the snow was bad enough, but with the kids in tow, and Marissa's cane nearly useless in the drifts, it would be impossible.

"Hey, Gary." He looked up to see Jeff and Luke standing before him. Rob was encouraging Trini into her coat.

"How can we help?"

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~


	9. Chapter 9

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

_Nothing's ever really gone, it's all here in my mind_  
 _There among the transparent layers of time_  
 _A face will rise up to the surface, smile_  
 _and fall below the waterline_  
 _We're like waves out on the water, we touch then move away_  
 _Living in a circle not a line_  
 _Just seeing how much compassion in this world we'll find_  
 _Like nomads_

~ Carrie Newcomer

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Bernardo didn't wake up when they slipped him into his own sweatpants, socks, and shoes. Luke and Jeff traded off carrying the boy and the rest of the little group's gear as they all made their way to the L stop. Gary, in his own jeans and sweater, over which he still wore the borrowed sweatshirt, was surprised at how warm he actually felt. Marissa stayed close on his right, her arm linked through his, and Lucy, who was too big to be carried, stumbled sleepily along at his left. Her hand in his was a weight of trust that he didn't dare think about too much.

By the time they reached the L, the snow had soaked back into his boots and his feet were getting chilly, but it was nothing compared to that earlier, numbing cold. This was a cold that Gary could almost be grateful for, because the warmth of the L train followed right on its heels. Once they were on the car, Marissa reclaimed Bernardo from Luke and Jeff. The boy woke up only long enough to smile drowsily at his sister across the aisle, then settled back to sleep while Marissa whispered something in his ear. Gary bit back a grin. The way things were going, he strongly suspected she wasn't going be pressuring him to call the authorities any time soon.

It was a short ride to the next stop, Lucy's head lolling on his shoulder, then just two blocks to Marissa's place. Luke and Jeff said their goodnights and tromped off through the snow, starting a snowball fight before they'd reached the end of the block. Their good-natured shouts echoed down the empty street as Gary closed and locked the door.

The kids were settled quickly in Marissa's spare bedroom, Lucy staying awake only long enough to take off her coat and shoes before dropping onto the bed, one arm over her brother. She was asleep before Marissa pulled a well-worn quilt over her.

Back downstairs, Marissa retrieved a pillow and some blankets from a chest under the front window. "Are you sure you're going to be warm enough down here?"

Gary wasn't sure if he'd ever really be warm again, but he shrugged. "Warmer than I would be if I went back outside to get home. Thanks, Marissa."

She was fussing with setting things out on the couch, but suddenly dropped onto it, arms crossed over the pillow on her lap, and let out an exhausted sigh. "Boy, when you make a choice, you make it good."

Gary flopped down next to her with a grunt. He still didn't know what to think about all that, and he was far too tired to figure it out now.

"Who exactly do we have up there, Gary?"

"I wish I knew." He told her about his suspicion that the kids hadn't been in the US, or at least not Chicago, for very long.

Marissa nodded. "Bernardo doesn't seem to understand much English, and Lucy has an accent."

How far had those two come, really? The implications were huge; immigration issues meant that there would be an even bigger tangle of red tape if Gary couldn't find their mom, and maybe even if he could. "You think we're in over our heads on this one?"

"Honestly, I don't know, but I think--"

"Mama!" The shrill cry sounded right over their heads. "Mama, mama, please mama!"

Gary took the steps three at a time. In the guest bedroom, he clicked on the bedside lamp. Bernardo was sitting up, blinking, but it was Lucy who had called out. She was lying on her stomach, sobbing again and pawing frantically at the empty air beyond the foot of the bed.

"Lucy--" Gary dropped to his knees on the braided rug, reaching for her hands. "Lucy, it's all right, it's only a dream, wake up, Lucy, it's over." She squeezed his hands tight and stopped struggling, sucking in great gulps of air. Her eyes were wide open, but unfocused. Whatever she was seeing, it wasn't in this room.

"What's going on?" Marissa asked from the doorway.

"She's having a nightmare. You'd better get Bernardo out of here," he told her in a low voice. He was barely aware of her lifting the still-not-quite-awake little boy out of the bed and carrying him into her own room. Gary was too focused on the wild-eyed Lucy. Her hair was coming out of Trini's neat braid in crazy wisps, standing out like a dark halo around her frightened face.

He rubbed the backs of her hands with his thumbs, trying to pull her back into reality. "C'mon, Lucy, what is it? It's okay now." How many times was he going to have to say that before it was true?

She drew in a deep breath, blinked, and focused on Gary, chin trembling. "It--it was my mama."

"You were dreaming about your mom?"

Lucy nodded, pulling herself up and scooting back to sit against the plain maple headboard. She drew her knees in to her chest as Gary sat down on the side of the bed.

"She was in the water, under the ice, just like Nardo," Lucy whispered. She stared at the foot of the bed as if the pond were really there, open and waiting to swallow her. "Mama was there, and I--I couldn't save her."

Gary's heart turned over in his chest at the pure, helpless misery in her eyes. "You wanted to help your mom, huh?"

"Diego was pulling her under. He wouldn't let go." Lucy's voice dropped even further, and she shivered. Gary reached for the edge of the crumpled quilt and pulled it over her knees.

"It was only a dream," he tried to tell her.

Lucy shook her head. "It was real. It was just like--just like when we left."

Now they were getting somewhere, but Gary wasn't sure he liked where they were going. It seemed like a pretty dark place. Marissa came back into the room with a glass of water. Lucy tried to drink, but her hands were shaking and droplets scattered over her chin and the quilt.

"You didn't want to run away from your mom, did you?" Gary asked, rescuing the glass and setting it on the night stand.

Still shivering, Lucy wrapped her arms around her knees. "I didn't--we weren't running away from her. It was him--I wanted her to come, but she wouldn't--she's afraid. She won't leave him, no matter what I say, no matter what he does. I--I wanted to help her, I wanted to save her, but she was so afraid. I told her I was smart, and I know English. We didn't need Diego. I could take care of us all, like I did after Papa died, I _told_ her that, but she wouldn't listen." Lucy's chin trembled, and her eyes brimmed over again, even as they pleaded with Gary for understanding, for absolution. "Why couldn't I save her?"

"Oh, Lucy," Marissa breathed.

Gary was thinking the same thing, but he couldn't breathe. The look in those eyes--he'd seen it before--in the mirror. To see it reflected back in the eyes of a girl, not even a teenager yet, that kind of agony, that much responsibility and pain...

He didn't have to think about what to do next. He reached out and took her by the shoulders, looking her right in the eye. "You listen to me, Lucy. You did save your mom. You have. Just now, you did. You did it for your brother already, and yourself, and now we're gonna help with your mom, okay? Okay? You just gotta trust us."

Lucy watched Gary for another moment, then nodded. Tears ran down her cheeks, but she was too used up to really cry any more. Gary hugged her. "We'll find your mom. And this Diego guy--"

As if she knew what Gary was about to ask, Marissa put a hand on his shoulder. He looked up to see her shaking her head. "She's had enough nightmares tonight," she whispered.

Gary gulped, then finished, "--he's not gonna bother you any more." Lucy nodded again, into his shoulder. Her whole body had gone limp with relief and exhaustion, and she let him settle her back onto the pillow, tucking her in as if she were half her real age.

That was only fair, Gary thought; she'd had to take on the burdens of someone twice her age for who knew how long.

She was back asleep by the time Marissa kissed the top of her head. Gary went out and turned on the hall light before shutting off the one in the spare room, just in case either of the kids woke up during the night. What was left of it, anyway. Marissa met him in the hallway, her expression troubled.

"Gary," she whispered, "I know you needed to say those things to her, but what if we can't find her mom?"

"We will," Gary told her.

"But--"

"We will," he repeated, "because we have to." He glanced back through the open doorway at Lucy's outline, barely visible in the soft grey dark. "I promised."

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Gary was warm enough that night; in fact, he was downright toasty. In his dreams, it was a dank summer afternoon by an algae-infested pond, and he was twelve years old, sweating as he picked kernels of corn from a can and threaded them onto a barbed hook.

"You sure this is gonna work?" he asked the boy sitting on the rock next to him.

Jason Miller shrugged. "Grandpa says it's how they always caught crawdads when he was a kid. 'Course, those were Louisiana crawdads, not Chicago crawdads. Try it over here on the other side; the drop off's steeper."

"What's crawdad taste like?" Gary asked as he clambered over the rocks to the good spot.

"Like shrimp, I guess. They look like shrimp."

"Yeah."

Gary wrapped the free end of his line around his finger, dropped the baited hook into the water, and lay down on his stomach so that he could peer into the water. He and Jason both had nets handy, just in case.

It was funny, everybody back in Hickory probably thought he was riding the El, going to Cubs games and movies, and doing all that city stuff, and maybe they would, later in the week, but here he was fishing for crawdads--he could probably do that in the creek behind his house. Still, it had been really nice of Mr. and Mrs. Miller to bring him along on this visit to see their son and his family. He'd known Jason since they were both little kids. Jason's parents always came back to spend holidays with his grandparents, and Gary had been glad to have another kid his age just down the block. They'd grown up with a mutual fascination for baseball, and just about any other sport, so they always had plenty to do together.

"Hey, Gary!" Jason's little brother Andy, freckled and sunburned, came running up to the pair on the rocks. "Catch anything yet?"

"Aw, man..." Jason, his eyes shadowed by his baseball cap, made a disgusted face. "Get out of here, will ya?"

"But I want to see what Gary's doing."

"Well, you saw, dork, now leave. Go play with the other babies on the swings."

"I'm not a baby anymore, _dork_ , I'm eight. Hey, Gary, who do you like better--R2D2 or C3P0?"

Gary and Jason exchanged a glance, and Jason rolled his eyes. "Chewbacca," they said in unison. Anybody knew a Wookie was better than a robot.

"Can I try?" Andy reached for the spool of line, but Jason swatted his hand away.

"No way."

"Aw, let him try it," Gary said. He kind of liked the little kid, though it was weird to have someone shadowing him all the time.

"Fine, but he goes over there." Jason waved his hand at the far side of the pond. "All his jabbering's gonna scare the crawdads away."

Gary helped Andy tie on the hook and bait it, and Andy scampered off around the pond, calling, "I'll show you guys! I'm gonna catch the most of all."

"Yeah, sure, booger head--without a net," Jason retorted, but not so loud that his brother could hear. He shook his head. "You are so lucky to be an only kid," he told Gary. "No little brothers to bug you, your own bedroom--must be rough."

"It's okay," Gary said with a shrug. He didn't want to argue with his friend, but sometimes he didn't think having a little brother would be so bad. At least then if he wanted to play catch, he wouldn't have to go looking all over the neighborhood for someone.

"Hey! Hey Gary, look!" Andy's voice piped across the pond. Gary looked up and saw the kid waving as he balanced on a log that lay half on the rocks and half over the water.

"Shut up, turd!"

"Hey Jason?" Gary was watching the little boy hold his arms out for balance as he ventured farther out over the water. Even from this distance, he could see the log wobbling. "Should he be out there?"

Jason heaved the long-suffering sigh of a put-upon older brother. "Andy, get back off that thing before--"

But it was too late; the log tilted down toward the water and then tumbled in, throwing Andy into the pond as well. Gary was up and running before the splash was done, unwrapping the fishing line from his finger as he sprinted around the pond. He heard Jason behind him, but Gary was faster, always had been. He got there first, and didn't stop to look for Andy, just dove off the rocks where the log had been.

He wasn't an idiot; he dove in at an angle, letting his arms lead him out to the deeper water. He'd just opened his eyes, trying to spot Andy in the murky depths, when something brushed his side, probably just a fish, but it startled Gary, and he jerked away from it too quickly, grazing his temple against a rock.

Wincing in pain, he almost missed the flash of blond hair that went by, but when he reached for it, it was gone. He was running out of breath, he had to get to the surface--but he wasn't sure anymore where the surface was. Darkness and water were everywhere; he kicked away, he didn't know in which direction, and got his feet tangled in the thick weeds. He couldn't get free, he reached down to tear the ropey plants away, but he was running out of air and there were spots in front of his eyes. He opened his mouth to call for help and the water rushed in and he knew he'd be lost down there forever, trapped. He'd be under the ice when winter came and no one would be there to help Lucy and Bernardo--they'd join him one day...

"No!"

Gary jolted awake, gasping for air. It took a moment to remember where he was, and why. He wasn't drowning, he wasn't even wet, but the blankets were tangled around his legs and he was sitting not on Marissa's couch, but on the floor.

He shook his head, rubbed his face, ran a hand through his hair. Awake now, he could see that it was still very early; the street outside the front window was quiet, the dark sky lightened by the pink tinge that snow in cities reflects back to the clouds. Gary put one elbow on the couch and one on the coffee table, intending to pull himself up and kick off the blankets, when he remembered the first part of his dream, and dropped back to the floor with a thump.

It had been real.

Not the drowning part; he'd never gotten that far. But the rest of it, the summer week in Chicago with his neighbors' grandkids, Jason and Andy, crawdad fishing in the same pond he'd fished Lucy and Bernardo out of tonight, Andy tumbling off the log into the murky water. All that had been real; the dream had only veered from reality when it came to what happened after Andy had fallen.

Gary had made it to the rocks, had poised for the dive through the algae bloom; even now he could remember sucking in a breath and squeezing his eyes shut...

...and then hands had grabbed him from behind and pulled him off the rock.

"Don't be stupid, kid," a gruff voice said, and a man, not as old as Mr. Miller but older than Gary's dad, knelt on the rocks, reached into the water, nowhere near where Gary would have landed had he made the dive, and pulled Andy out of the pond by his overall straps. Sputtering and coughing, the little boy was scared, but otherwise all right.

"Thanks, Mister," Jason said, and then proceeded to chew out his little brother for the stunt he'd pulled. "Geez, Andy, how could you be such a moron? Mom's gonna kill you!"

"You were supposed to be watching me!"

The man put a hand on Gary's shoulder, drawing his attention away from the bickering brothers. Gary could recall sharp blue eyes, but the rest of the face was fuzzy in his memory. "Next time you decide to save somebody," the man told Gary sternly, "look for him before you jump."

Wide-eyed, Gary nodded. "Thanks."

The man's face softened into a smile. "You're a good kid, Gary Hobson." He strode off through the trees, leaving Gary gaping.

"Hey, we better go home," said Jason.

"Do you know that guy?" Gary pointed toward the trees, but the man was no longer in sight.

Jason shrugged. "Uh-uh."

"Andy?"

"Nope."

Gary frowned. "Then how'd he know my name?"

"I dunno." Jason pushed his brother onto the path around the pond, prodding him ahead of the older boys. "He was kinda spooky, wasn't he? I bet he was some kinda bum."

"What are you talking about?" Aside from knowing his name, the old guy had seemed merely helpful.

"Didn't you see his hands? Even after he got Andy out of the water, they were still dirty."

And back then, Gary had shrugged that off; in fact, except for the faint memories of the park's layout that had niggled at his brain all day, he'd pretty much forgotten the entire incident. But now--well, pond water wouldn't wash away ink stains...

He shook his head as he untangled his legs from the blankets. Now it was all coming back to him, clear as day: Jason, Andy, crawdads, and the man who, if Gary's dream was any indication, might have saved Gary's life by keeping him out of the pond.

It wasn't possible, was it? It couldn't have been--

But the old man had known his name.

Anything can happen...

...Things happen for a reason...

Gary stretched back out on the couch, thoughts and memories whirling through his befuddled brain. Too tired to work it all out, he slipped back into sleep, wondering if he really could remember a rolled-up newspaper in the man's back pocket, or if that mental picture was just his exhausted mind playing tricks on him.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~


	10. Chapter 10

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

_You were born_  
 _to nomads_  
 _though you didn't_  
 _want to be..._  
 _another town_  
 _another round_  
 _in a world_  
 _that made you_  
 _dizzy_

~ Odilia Galván Rodríguez

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

The meow came far too early. It was also too close to Gary's ear.

When he blinked against the first dim rays of morning sun, he moved the arm that had been covering his face down to his chest. Immediately his hand was licked by a sandpaper tongue.

"Oh for crying out loud," Gary muttered. As awareness dawned, he could feel the weight of the cat on his stomach, and the force of its steely stare. He let his hand flop over the edge of the couch, where another, bigger slap of wet tongue went to work on the spots the cat had missed.

"Cut it out, Reilly." Taking that as an invitation, the guide dog plopped his head onto Gary's chest, and now, in his half-awake state, Gary had to deal with two stares. He blinked his eyes fully open...

Make that three.

Three stares and a giggle.

"Good morning, Bernardo."

Bright black eyes twinkling under long dark lashes, the little boy broke into a wide grin. "Is dat su gato? "

"I told you, that's a cat." Lucy's voice carried from the kitchen.

Gary groaned as he sat up. The few hours of sleep he'd had weren't nearly enough to ease the stiffness and aches of the night before. He picked up the cat under its front legs and held it out to Bernardo. "You want it?"

The boy giggled again and ran back into the kitchen, Reilly on his heels. Cat meowed.

"Looks like you're stuck with me, buddy," Gary told it. He swung his feet to the floor, letting the tabby wriggle out of his hands. Cat, too, headed for the kitchen. "Must be where all the action is." From the smells wafting through the first floor, there were definitely interesting things going on in there, and Gary's stomach rumbled at the scents of coffee and bacon.

Retrieving the paper from the foot of the couch, he padded into the kitchen. Marissa and both children were already dressed; Marissa was busy cooking while Lucy set the table and Bernardo played with the animals on the floor.

"Good morning, Gary. Hungry?"

"Well, yeah." Gary goggled blearily at the eggs she was scrambling. Somehow he'd never pictured Marissa as the big breakfast type. "Do you always eat like this?"

"Not at 6:30 in the morning, but I thought we could all use a little sustenance after last night."

There was more than a night's worth of hunger to make up for, Gary thought, noting again how thin both children were. Lucy looked smaller than ever without that useless trench coat covering her up. Neither her red cardigan nor the wide-collared, blue-checked shirt she wore under it reached her wrists, and yet they both hung loosely on her frame. The braid was gone, but her hair was neatly pinned back from her face with a couple of barrettes.

Over in the corner, Bernardo sat with his back against Reilly's bulk, feet spread wide, teasing the cat with a twist tie from the bread. He batted it back and forth between his hands on the tile floor while Cat tried to pin it down with a paw. Funny, the animal had never seemed much interested in pet games before. Gary opened his mouth to say something, then shrugged. Might as well let them have their fun. At that moment, Cat spared a glance over its shoulder, and if he hadn't known better Gary would have sworn the thing was winking at him. Shaking his head, he turned his attention back to the meal preparations. He listened to Marissa cheerfully telling Lucy where to find the silverware, then asked, "Are you always this chipper at 6:30 in the morning?"

Spatula poised over the skillet, Marissa cocked her head to one side, grinned, and then nodded. "Yes."

"Sadist." Gary dropped into the closest chair.

She chuckled. "How'd you sleep?"

"Well, uh--" He ran a hand through his hair. "We're gonna need to talk about that."

Marissa raised one eyebrow, but didn't press him any further.

The twist tie skittered under the table. Scooting over to retrieve it, Bernardo stared up at Gary for a moment, then fired off a question in Spanish. Lucy, who was passing forks around the table, shook her head. "No. I already told you that last night." He tried another one, this time while watching Marissa. "I'm not going to ask her. You ask her yourself. In _English_ , Nardo."

Sidling up to Marissa, Bernardo tugged on the hem of her sweater. "How do you know what's to cook?"

Marissa smiled down at him. "I'm not sure what you mean."

"He wants to know how you can cook breakfast when you can't see the food and the pans and stuff," Lucy explained.

"Oh, that's easy. I feel things. Here, close your eyes." Once she'd demonstrated, Bernardo mimicked her. "Hold out your hand--no peeking." Marissa placed an egg in his palm. "What's that?"

"Huevo!"

"Nardo..."

Bernardo turned his sister, all wide-eyed innocence. "Don't know the word, Lucy."

She sighed. "Egg. That's a simple one. I can't believe you forgot it."

Gary grinned at her worldly, grown-up tone. "Kids, huh?" he asked her with a wink, but she ignored him, concentrating instead on finishing her task, while Marissa tried to explain Braille labels to Bernardo.

The last fork in place, Lucy didn't seem to know what to do with herself. She watched Marissa, looked out the window, drifted over to pet a grateful Reilly--all while assiduously avoiding eye contact with Gary. Was there anything in the world more uncomfortable than an embarrassed pre-teen? She didn't need to worry, however; he didn't plan on bringing up last night just yet. Right now, it was nice to pretend, for a few minutes at least, that all this was perfectly normal.

Gary unrolled and was about to open the paper when the front page photo caught his eye. Bernardo saw it, too; he hurried over from the range, egg still in hand.

"Frog! From the--the--from yesterday, Lucy, recuerda?"

"From the _park_ ," Lucy corrected. Gary held up the paper so she, too, could see the photos of Jeff's snow sculptures that graced the _Sun-Times_ , along with the headline, "Gallery in White." A shiver ran through Lucy's body, so strong that Gary could see it. She pressed her lips together and nodded, then got up to help Marissa butter toast, taking the egg from Bernardo's hand as she did so.

"Pretty cool, huh?" Gary asked Bernardo. "You like the robot?" The boy nodded with a wide, toothy grin when he saw what Gary was pointing at.

"Okay, let's eat." Marissa brought plates of bacon and toast to the table.

Gary jumped up. "Sit down, I got the eggs." This was more food than he'd had for breakfast in quite a while--most days, if he was lucky, he had time for a muffin or a bagel, and--oh yeah, coffee. Leaving the eggs for the moment, he grabbed the pot to fill Marissa's cup, and his own. When he turned from the counter he stared in surprise--Bernardo, though gazing longingly at the food, was backing out the door.

"Hey, where you going, big guy? It's time to eat." But the boy stayed in the doorway, glued to his spot.

"What is it?" asked Marissa.

Lucy sighed. "He's forgotten about eating with grownups."

"What?" Gary frowned in confusion as he poured the coffee, while Lucy walked around the table and took her brother by the hand, leading him to an empty chair and saying something to him in Spanish, softly, but Gary caught his own name, and Marissa's, and, again, like a specter that wouldn't leave those kids alone, "Diego".

Bernardo, still watching the adults apprehensively, slid into the chair, and Lucy explained, "Diego never let us eat with him and Mama. He said kids needed to be _not_ seen and _not_ heard, and that he saw too much of us as it was." Doling out eggs, Gary froze, spatula suspended in mid-air. The matter-of-fact tone with which she related it was worse than the words themselves. "We had to wait until he was finished, and then Mama would feed us when he left. But she wouldn't eat with us. He didn't like that." She shrugged. "Nardo is little. He just forgot that sometimes people eat together. I told him you wouldn't yell at him or kick him or anything if he sat at the table at the same time as you guys."

Marissa sucked in her breath and made a strangled, choking sound that brought Gary back to the present. He snuck a glance at his horrified friend, and cleared his throat. Resumed his task as though nothing had been said, as though he didn't want to find this guy Diego and strangle him with his bare hands already. He tried to match the girl's calm tone. "You're right, Lucy, we wouldn't."

Regaining her composure, Marissa uncurled her fingers from the edge of the table. Gary patted her shoulder surreptitiously as he moved to set the empty frying pan on the counter. They were in this together, and they were more than in over their heads, but they had to keep their anger from the kids. They'd seen too much of that already.

"We want you here--both of you," Marissa said, her voice carrying only the slightest edge. "It's wonderful to have such good company for breakfast."

Gary sat back down, his appetite diminished. Still, out of force of habit, he picked up his fork, aiming for the eggs, until he realized that no one else at the table had moved. Lucy folded her hands, and Bernardo followed suit.

"Oh, yeah." Gary, too, folded his hands. "Grace," he muttered, just in case Marissa wasn't picking it up.

Well, if she hadn't been, she would have a moment later, when Lucy made the sign of the cross. "In the name of the Father..." Her brother watched her, imitating the motions and echoing her a syllable or two behind. It was the traditional Catholic mealtime prayer: "Bless us, oh Lord, and these your gifts..."

Though Gary sat politely, hands folded, head bowed, he couldn't help juxtaposing the image of these kids, faithfully thanking God for whatever food they got, with the thought of them being told, in words and actions, that they weren't worth it. Maybe Marissa was thinking the same thing; she chewed on her lip throughout the short prayer, though she joined in on the "Amen." Gary echoed it as another thought occurred to him--maybe this was what made it bearable at all. Lucy and Bernardo crossed themselves again, and then began eating, Bernardo waiting until Lucy took a bite and nodded at him.

Once he got started, though, there was no stopping him. He snarfed down half his eggs in the time it took Gary to swallow his first drink of coffee, and asked for more toast before his sister had jam on hers. Bernardo managed to get strawberry preserves on the table, himself, and the dog, in that order, as he insisted on topping his toast himself. Lucy scowled at the mess until Gary joined in Bernardo's laughter at Reilly, who was trying desperately to lick all the jam off his nose, and they all relaxed a little. Long enough to finish breakfast, anyway.

Eating at the speed of sound meant that Bernardo finished before anyone else. Anxious to speak to Lucy and get some details, Gary took him into the living room, turned on the tiny television that Marissa kept for guests and for the few programs she listened to, and, lucky day, stumbled onto a show about a blue cartoon dog and a real human. "Blue's Clues!" Bernardo exclaimed, and settled happily onto the couch, still licking jam off his fingers. Cat and Reilly weren't far behind.

"Scavengers," Gary muttered as he stepped over them on his way back to the kitchen. The sun was finally coming through the windows as it put in a late appearance, brightening the room. Lucy met his eyes once, then quickly stared back down at her nearly-empty plate. Though she'd eaten as much as her brother, she'd left hardly any sign of having been at the table--no crumbs, no spills, no smears. Here was a kid who was used to disappearing.

"Hey, uh, Lucy, how old are you?" he asked, feigning a casual tone as he refilled his coffee and sat back down.

"Eleven," she said, a cautious note in her voice. "I'll be twelve in March."

That would put her in, what--fifth grade? Sixth? When Gary had been that age, his biggest worries had been his batting average and math homework. Well, that and...and crawdad fishing, he thought, remembering the dream he'd had last night.

Marissa had picked up the ball. "Where are you from?"

"From?" Lucy didn't look up; she traced patterns with her fork in the bit of jam and eggy goo left on her plate.

"Where did you live before you came to Chicago?"

"Lots of places...um, Texas, and Oklahoma, and--" Her frown deepened. "Missouri."

"What about before you came to the United States?" Marissa asked. Her own meal finished, she sat with both hands folded in her lap, head held high in the same pose she used when she was about to grill Gary over something. To his surprise, though, the question unleashed a Lucy they hadn't known existed.

"Oh!" She beamed at them both, the smile suffusing her face with warm light; her eyes grew unfocused and dreamy. "I was born in La Union. In El Salvador," she added, when neither Gary nor Marissa reacted. "So was Nardo, but I don't think he remembers. He was only two when we left."

Gary blinked. "That's a long way from Chicago." Lucy met his eyes, and the light in her face dimmed. She nodded.

"Lucy," Marissa asked, "can you tell us about it? Tell us how you got here."

"I--I don't know how..."

"Make it like a story--like one of your books."

Gary, who thought it might be best to keep it in safe territory at first, added, "Tell us about El Salvador. I've never been there."

"It is warm," Lucy said, and she rubbed her arms and closed her eyes. Her voice drifted into a stronger accent, musical and soft. "It is warm, and there are mountains, and the sea, and trees. It's so green, and the clouds would come and sit on hills like a blanket, y a veces los domingos Papá nos tomaría a la playa al juego en las ondas..."

She didn't seem to realize she'd slipped into Spanish. It didn't even matter to Gary. She was talking about home, and she was happy, even if it was only for a moment. He wasn't going to break the spell she was using to cocoon herself in a little bit of comfort.

"But it was poor." Switching back to English with an ease that would have made Gary's high school Spanish teacher envious, she shook her head and traced the raised flowers along the rim of her plate with one finger. "Everyone was poor. The hurricane came, and it knocked down all the trees in the coffee plantation. Papa and Mama couldn't find work. So when Uncle Luis wrote from Chicago, Papa decided to bring us here. I didn't want to come. I liked my friends and my school." She met Gary's eyes for a brief second, then looked down again. "That's where I first learned English, you know."

"You must have had a great teacher. You speak better English than some adults around here."

"Señora Ernesto said I was the best in the whole class," Lucy said, without pride or guile. "She said I was smart. But Papa said there would be better schools here, and we would be able to go to school for longer than he had. Mama never went to school at all. They wanted a better life for us." She blinked back tears. "Papa brought us here because he loved us."

Marissa reached over and squeezed Lucy's hand. "How could he help loving you, Lucy? You're a wonderful girl, smart and brave and kind." Lucy stared at Marissa as if she'd just been told that the sky was purple and the ocean red. She shook her head and opened her mouth, but Gary jumped in.

"You gotta trust Marissa," he told Lucy. "She's always right. Just ask her."

Marissa turned to him in mock indignation. "Gary, I do not think I'm always right."

"Well, you are," Gary said with a slightly wicked smile. "Most of the time." Unfortunately, their lighthearted teasing didn't bring back the smile Gary'd been hoping for. Lucy looked from one to another, confused.

"It's okay," Gary assured her. They'd better get on with it, then. "So you came here."

She shook her head. "We didn't have enough money to get all the way to Chicago at first, so we worked on the farms--well, I did in the summer."

Gary wondered about that. He'd had friends who had detasseled corn; he'd even done it himself for a grand total of two weeks before the heat, the bugs, and the sharp edges of the corn leaves had convinced him that a paper route, while less lucrative financially, was still a better job. But he'd been fourteen at the time. Was it really legal to have kids Lucy's age--heck, she couldn't have been more than ten--doing that kind of labor? Her next words convinced him that it couldn't have been.

"Some of the other kids, they'd work all the time, not just in summers, but Papa always had me go to school." Her head nodded slightly as she said this, as if to say that she agreed with her father's decision. "He made me practice English all summer, too, and wherever we were, he'd find a library and let me spend Saturdays there. He said that if I knew the language here, people would listen to me. They would take notice. Some of the teachers did, sometimes. They liked it that I always knew the lessons. Mrs. Marchisi, my teacher in Texas, even gave me _Anne of Green Gables_." Lucy's expression slid into wistfulness. "I wanted to read the rest of them, but then we had to move. I loved Anne."

Marissa smiled. "Me too. Isn't it great when she breaks the slate over Gilbert's head?"

"Yes." But Lucy's plaintive smile had disappeared. "I left my book at...at..." She turned to Gary. "Do you think Mama will bring it to me, when you find her?"

"I don't know. I'll try, okay?" She nodded, and Gary brought the conversation back to the main point with a blunt question. "Lucy, what happened to your father?"

Her face closed over. She bit her lip, and looked down at her plate. "The last farm we worked at, in Missouri...he got sick. There wasn't money for a doctor, he said. He said he would be okay. But then he got more sick, and they took him to the hospital, and he--he died." Lucy waged a battle for control, gulping in air and squeezing handfuls of her linen napkin. She let out her breath and continued, with more steel in her voice than Gary had thought a kid could muster. "When they took him to the hospital, I had to stay with Nardo, but I wanted to go and help Papa. He told me to--to be a big girl, and to take care of the family. He said that we still were going to Chicago." Her voice had dropped to a whisper. "Mama didn't know how to talk to the doctors. I could have--" She gulped, and stared at Gary. "Do you think if I had been there, I could have helped him?"

Gary didn't know what the situation had been exactly, and he didn't care. All he wanted was for this girl to stop blaming herself for rotten luck, and for the screwups made by the adults in her life. He reached for her hand, still clenching the napkin. Her fingers uncurled under his own as he told her, "The thing about doctors, Lucy, is that they can do what they need to do without a lot of talking. They can usually figure out what's wrong with someone with just a couple tests. I'm sure they did everything they could for your father, and nothing you did could have changed it."

She searched Gary's eyes, her own wide. "Really?"

"Really," Marissa told her firmly while Gary nodded. "This time it's Gary who's right. But still," she added, her voice losing its edge, "it must have been very hard for you to lose your Papa like that."

Lucy sniffed, pulled her hand out from under Gary's, and brushed it over her eyes. "Mama had to ask people for money so we could wear nice clothes to his funeral. Papa wouldn't have liked that, but Mama said we had to do what was right by him and by the church." She recited all this carefully, controlled, and Gary knew there wasn't going to be a scene like the one the night before. Then, she'd been exhausted, all her defenses down. Now she was in control again, the brave strong girl her papa had left in charge. Still, Marissa's hand slid across the table again to squeeze Lucy's, and this time she didn't let go.

Lucy swiped at her eyes one more time with her free hand. "After that, we had to work some more, both Mama and I, until we had enough money to come here. All summer. All over the place. But we had to come; it was what Papa wanted, and there was no place else to go. Uncle Luis lived here--Mama had the envelope with his address from his last letter. We walked there from the bus station." Her eyes went wide at the memory. "I'd never walked so far and still been in a city, never. The buildings are so tall, and so many people. I thought it must be as big as San Salvador. Now I know it's even bigger than that. And that all the people...not many of them are..." She drew in a deep breath, and Gary could hardly hear her when she finished. "Not many of them are like you guys."

Gary wondered just how far the little family had walked. It could have been a very long way, and if Lucy's mom didn't speak English, that meant the girl would have been in charge of asking for directions, leading the way through a completely foreign city. Most adults would cringe at the prospect of shouldering of such a responsibility. No wonder Lucy'd thought she needed to save her mother, too.

"When we got there, Uncle Luis wasn't living in the apartment his letter came from. Nobody knew where he'd gone. Mama sat down in the hall of that apartment building and cried and cried. She just sat on our suitcase and held Nardo and cried for hours, it seemed like. I told her it would be all right. I told her I would get a job here, too, until we could find Uncle Luis, but she said this was the city, and I couldn't work here." She glanced up at Gary, and the dark shadows were back in her eyes. "We were still in the lobby of that apartment building when he found us."

The venom and despair in that simple, two-letter pronoun stiffened Gary's own spine. "You mean the man you were talking about last night. Diego?"

Lucy nodded. "He was the manager, but he lied and told Mama at first that he owned the building. I think he liked Mama, he thought she was pretty. She is, she's really pretty, when she's not tired. But she'd been crying all day; I don't know why he thought she was pretty then. He said there was a place we could stay. It was his apartment.

"At first he was nice. He made Nardo and me be quiet all the time, but he let me go to school--he even went to sign me up, because Mama couldn't. She was so afraid because she didn't speak English, you know, and Papa had always told her she should learn, and she'd always laughed at him. Diego told Mama she wouldn't have to get a job if she helped him with the apartments. Help," Lucy spat, with a cynicism that was as far from the normal kid's as her sense of responsibility. "She did all the work, all of it. He even tried to make her fix the plumbing. Mama knows sewing and coffee beans and corn, not plumbing! When she made mistakes, he would yell at her, and sometimes he...he..." Lucy squeezed her eyes shut and gulped in air.

"Diego hit your mom, didn't he?" Marissa asked softly.

Lucy choked back a little sob. "Yes. I tried to tell her we should go look for Uncle Luis. I even tried to use the phone books and the computer at school to find him. I knew that was what Papa wanted, that was why he brought us here. He wanted us to come to Chicago, but not...not like this."

A dream, and a simple one at that, turned into a nightmare. Gary wished he could have been there, wished anyone could have been there, to stop any of the wrong turns that had led to this situation.

"What else did he do, Lucy?" There was a slight, shaky edge in Marissa's voice. "Did he ever hurt you?"

Lucy's glance flitted over at Marissa's face, then Gary's. There was something she couldn't come right out and say, not just yet. "I stopped going to school. I knew it was wrong, but I couldn't--I couldn't protect them if I was at school."

"Them?" Gary tried to keep his tone careful, gentle, but he didn't quite succeed. "You mean he hit your brother?"

"He--he usually didn't hit. He usually just yelled at us. But sometimes..." She gulped. "He said that if we ever told, he would send us all out on the street. Afterwards, he would say he was sorry, but that was a worthless word. Papa told me you shouldn't say anything you don't mean, and Diego didn't mean it, he never meant it. I know, because he would always do it again." Lucy drew in a deep breath. "Father Estevez, at our church in La Union, always said God wants us to love everyone. I tried to be a good girl and be grateful, like Mama said, but--but I couldn't. I hate him."

Gary was pretty sure that the good Father hadn't intended to include anyone as evil as Diego in his dictum. If he had, well, then the man was a whole lot more forgiving than Gary ever would be.

"You don't have to love someone who hurts you," Marissa told Lucy. "That isn't what Father Estevez meant. God didn't want you to get hurt. You wouldn't be here right now if that was true." Lucy squirmed in her seat.

Still fuming, still unable to believe that their mother hadn't tried harder to protect her kids, Gary asked, "What made you run away?"

At that, Lucy sighed, her shoulders drooping under the weight of memory. "Mama always told us to stay out of the way if we could, but...one time, it was right after Christmas, he wanted a beer, and he told Nardo to get it. Nardo was coloring on the floor, and he didn't hear. Diego kicked him, hard..." Lucy sucked in a breath. Clutching at Marissa's hand like a lifeline, her other arm wrapped around her stomach, she rocked in her seat, back and forth, back and forth. "It wasn't fair. Bernardo's too little! So I stepped in the way when he tried to do it again. I told him if he wanted to kick and hit, he should do it to me, because at least I had the guts to stand up to him, and I was old enough to take it!"

Gary wanted her to stop. He didn't want to hear anymore. He had to, but--

He really didn't want to.

Over on his left, Marissa's free hand was covering her mouth, trying to hold in her outrage.

Unlike the adults, Lucy wasn't crumbling. If anything, she looked fiercer than ever, her anger lending strength, her eyes flashing cold, cold light. "So he gave it to me. He hit me. And Mama--Mama tried to stop him, and he turned on her. And that's when I knew."

She stopped, head bowed, silent.

"Lucy? What did you know?"

When she looked up at Gary again, the anger was gone, and all that was left was the cold, terrible weight of responsibility. "I knew that if we stayed it would only get worse. When he left to drink at the bar, I told Mama we should leave, but she wouldn't, she was too afraid. She said he would find us and send us back to El Salvador, or have us put in jail. He told her all kinds of things about immigration people and the police, and I think they were mostly lies, but she believed them."

"So," Gary said, pushing the words past his anger, "you ran away."

Lucy sighed and nodded, her eyes bleak. "Two days later."

Gary glanced out the window over the sink, at the cold, snowy yard. Up until yesterday, they'd only had a few inches of snow all season. There was no way Lucy could have known what to expect from a Chicago winter. "That means you've been on your own since..."

"New Year's Eve." Lucy looked so tired, almost as tired as she had last night, and Gary hated to keep pressing her to talk about this. But how else was he supposed to help her?

"There were people over, Diego's friends, and he told us to keep out of the way. I waited until they were good and drunk, and then I took--I took some of his money. Not a lot. I'm not dumb. If he'd noticed, he would have blamed Mama, and--but I took it from his sock drawer, where he kept extra for beer and cigarettes. I thought--I thought by the time he noticed it, I would have found Uncle Luis, and he'd help us pay it back. And I tried, we stayed at the library every night, until the guard found us and kicked us out a couple days ago, and I looked in all the phone books, but he isn't there."

"And you didn't tell your mother you were leaving?" Marissa asked gently.

Lucy shook her head. "She wouldn't have come. I thought that if we left, maybe it would be easier for her, maybe Diego wouldn't have us to get mad at, and he wouldn't be so mean. But now I think--I think he's not going to get any less mean. I think he'll always hurt Mama." Her voice broke, and hopelessness leaked through the cracks. "He's hurting her now, and I don't know what to do."

Her face a mirror of the anger and sorrow Gary himself felt, Marissa got up and stood next to Lucy, putting an arm around the girl's shoulders. Lucy blinked back tears at the contact, but didn't relax.

Elbows on the table, Gary leaned forward, sought and held her gaze, making sure she saw how deeply he meant what he was about to say. "The first thing, Lucy, is that you know that you're safe. He's not going to touch you again. No matter what we have to do. I don't know exactly what is going to happen, but we will make sure that happens, okay? He had no right to hurt you, to hurt any of you, and you were very brave to stand up to him."

She shook her head fiercely. "I wasn't brave." She turned her face into Marissa's side. "I left my mama with him."

"No, no, no, Lucy." Marissa turned and pulled the girl in close. "You did what you had to do, and it was a very brave thing. Gary told you last night, remember? You got your brother away, and because you did, you met us, and now we can find a way to help your mom."

Lucy turned her face to look at Gary, her eyes wet. "You said we'd find her."

Gary nodded. "We will."

"And then what will happen?"

"I don't know, Lucy." Gary reached to the counter behind him and pulled a tissue from the box there, offering it to Lucy. "But we'll do everything we can to help you."

Sniffling into the tissue, she pulled away from Marissa. "I want Mama, and I--I want--"

It was almost as if she didn't dare say it. Gary raised an eyebrow and forced the corners of his mouth up, trying to encourage her with a smile.

"I want to go to school again."

At that, Gary really did smile, a small but genuine grin, just like the one he saw on Marissa's face. "I think we can help with that, too."

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~


	11. Chapter 11

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

_Everything that's done gets done in a circle_  
 _Everything that's hidden gets brought to the light_  
 _When wisdom speaks, close your mouth and listen_  
 _When something's wrong make it right_  
 _We shall surely be known forever by the tracks we leave_

~ Carrie Newcomer

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

The tension broken, Marissa patted Lucy on the shoulder. "Tell us your mom's name, your last name, and where Diego's apartment was." Lucy did so, spelling out the names while Gary wrote everything down. Not that he would have trouble remembering most of it. Inez Savaria. A last name like music. Diego Linares. In Gary's mind, those two words were carved in ice. A south side address, a run down neighborhood, a cold, colorless place to raise two kids. The pencil broke when Gary stamped a frustrated period at the end of the street name.

Marissa cleared her throat. "Lucy, I need you to go sit with your brother. Gary and I have to talk. We're not trying to hurt you or shut you out," she explained gently, "but we have to decide what to do next."

Lucy looked from one to the other, brow furrowed. "I think I should get a chance to decide. It's my life."

And she'd fought tooth and claw to hang onto it. Gary wondered what Marissa was up to, but he let her play it out.

"You're right. We won't decide anything without talking to you first, but Lucy, we do have to talk, grownup to grownup, before anything can happen. Will you go in and see what your brother's up to?"

Lucy finally nodded, wary, but willing, for now, to trust them. Gary wondered just how long it had been since she'd been able to trust anyone. "Okay."

"Just give us a few minutes," said Marissa, and dropped into her chair as Lucy left the room.

Gary was too overwhelmed to try to suss out Marissa's reasoning on his own. She sat with her elbow on the table, chin cupped in her hand. "My God, Gary," she sighed when the soft rise and fall of the children's voices drifted in from the living room.

"Yeah." It was all he knew to say. There was really nothing else that could be said; no way to sum up the history that Lucy had just laid out for them. Gary leaned back against the counter. "She teared up a little bit here and there, but for the most part that kid was as cool as an expert witness in court."

"Which is part of why I wanted to get her out of here for a couple of minutes," Marissa explained. "After everything she's had to carry, she needs to know she doesn't always have to be the adult. She needs a chance to be a kid."

"What if that chance has passed her by, though?" Gary twirled the pencil in his fingers, staring at the information he'd jotted on the pad of paper. "I mean, it's not like we can take away what's happened to her."

"No, but hopefully we can give her the chance to set it aside for a while." Marissa got up and started carrying dishes from the table to the sink. "She has to deal with it, and both those kids are deeply traumatized, but--well, once in a while we all have to let go our burdens and let someone else be in charge."

"Yeah." Gary opened three different drawers before he found the towels. "So now we find her mom..."

"What is it?" Marissa had caught the hesitation in his voice.

"It's just--how could a mother let that happen to her kids? I mean, not that my dad ever would have done anything like that, but if he'd tried, I know my mom would have hauled me out of Hickory in a heartbeat."

Flashing a rueful smile, Marissa handed him a plate to dry. "Your mom probably would have laid Bernie flat out on the floor with an uppercut to the jaw." Her smile faded as she added, "But Inez Savaria isn't your mom. She's all alone, she thinks she has to rely on this--this vulture for everything. It sounds as if he's convinced her that the sky will fall in on her if she walks away from him. I'm sure she's scared to death, Gary, and that fear can be paralyzing."

"I think it's clean." Gary took the spoon Marissa had been scrubbing within an inch of its life from her hand. "Okay. I get it. And I do feel sorry for her. I just don't know how she could miss what was happening to her own kids."

"Maybe because it was happening to her, too." Silverware clattered into the basket and Marissa reached for the sprayer to rinse them off.

"What a mess," Gary muttered. He dried all the forks and knives at once, but put them away carefully in their appointed spots, so Marissa would be able to find them again. "So now we go get Inez."

"Well...yes. But maybe we need to think it through first--I mean, you can't just go charging in there like St. George after a dragon."

"Why the hell not?"

"Well, for one thing, you don't have a horse."

"Ha." Gary couldn't even make it sound like a laugh.

"She may not even be there. No matter how scared she is, she has to want them back. And we don't know how dangerous this man truly is."

It was quiet for a moment, except for the clinking of glasses in the soapy water and the faint squeak of the towel against china. The sun glinted off the snow outside the window, the bright, sharp light casting blue shadows of the neighbor's fence. It was going to be a cold day; thank goodness those kids were in the next room, and not hanging out in another alley somewhere.

"Gary?"

"Hmm?"

"What did you mean about last night? When you said you wanted to talk to me about how you'd slept?"

"Oh." In the rush of new information, he'd nearly forgotten his dream, and what he'd remembered afterward. He outlined it for Marissa, both versions.

"But Gary, that would mean--" Her hands paused in the middle of scrubbing the fry pan; her eyes widened in wonder. "Lucius Snow saved your life!"

"It--uh--kinda seems that way, maybe."

"Maybe? He knew your name, you remember the ink stains on his fingers, and it was the same pond we were at last night? You're sure?"

"Yeah, but--doesn't that strike you as next to impossible? I mean, what are the chances?"

"Maybe it wasn't chance at all. Look, you said you knew the Millers because their grandparents lived near you in Hickory? Why did they like you so much?"

"I--I don't know." Gary shrugged. "Mrs. Miller always told me I was a good kid. I shoveled their walks and stuff, and there was one time I found her husband's medicine on the street and brought it to her." Marissa's mouth opened; she was about to make some kind of point, so he quickly added, "I was only in it for the cookies, though. She made the best chocolate chip oatmeal in the county."

Ignoring the last bit, Marissa pointed a soapy finger in Gary's direction. "You set yourself up for it. All of it."

"What are you talking about?"

"You were who you are--the kind of person you are--a long time before that paper showed up at your doorstep." Marissa finished washing the pan with a knowing smile. "If you hadn't been so kind to the Millers, you wouldn't have been here in Chicago when Andy fell in that pond."

Gary took the skillet, rinsed it, and started to dry. "Yeah, but Snow would have fished him out."

"Maybe, maybe not. According to your dream, he was there to save your life, at least as much as Andy's. If you hadn't been there at all, Gary, who knows? Maybe the paper would have been passed on to someone else."

Dropping the pan on the counter with a rattle that made Marissa jump, Gary stared at his friend with his mouth half-open. "You don't seriously think he did this to me. What, you think I'm gonna wish this on someone else when I--when I--"

"That won't be for a long time," Marissa told him firmly. "And no, I don't think he wished it on you. But what if there had been no Lucius Snow that day? What if he'd made some other choice with how he used the paper? Where would you be then? And where would all the people you've saved be?"

Tossing the damp towel over his shoulder, Gary leaned against the counter with a sigh, his back to the window. "Well, I guess somebody else would have--"

"No." Marissa slapped a hand on the edge of the sink, sending up a little spray of water. "Somebody else would have done it differently, and you, and those of us who owe our lives to you, Gary, we'd all be--well, things would be a whole lot different. This is what I've been trying to tell you since yesterday. You are not who you are because you get the paper. You get the paper because of who you are."

"What do you mean?"

"You haven't read the paper this morning, have you?"

"No." He glanced guiltily at the floor under his chair, where the Sun-Times still waited for him. "But you know what, I thought about that, too, and what--what happened last night, that wouldn't have been in the paper anyway, would it?"

"Which is exactly my point. You went to help because you wanted to, not because the paper compelled you to. And now you're planning to spend the day helping those kids even more."

Gary fingered the fringe of his towel, but he didn't say anything. One part of his brain was busy trying to fit all these pieces together, while the other was thinking that all these years in choir must have really developed Marissa's breath control. The woman could talk a blue streak when she put her mind to it.

"The point is," she continued, going in for the kill as only Marissa could, "It's all connected, whether you want it to be or not, even when you can't see the connections. You never know when saving one small, unimportant life can change the whole world, because the truth is, no life is unimportant." She indicated the living room with a wave of her hand. "It might not be smart to get this involved every time, but sometimes, it pays off. Everything the paper gives you to do matters in some way."

"Everything?" Gary asked, thinking of all the trivial saves he'd been handling lately.

"Everything. Including saving a drug-addled girl from a mugging. Without Trini, Lucy wouldn't have opened up last night. What's more, if you hadn't saved her life and met her friends, we might not have gone back for that dumpster fire, and we wouldn't have been in the park when Bernardo fell through the ice."

"I guess you're right." Maybe Marissa was comfortable with finding cosmic patterns and purpose in everything, but Gary's head was spinning. It had never really occurred to him that he'd brought the paper on himself, and it was strange to think that all the time he'd been complaining about it, some part of him had wanted it in his life--that he himself was part of the equation that determined what showed up on his doorstep every morning.

After a pause, Marissa picked up a sponge and started wiping down the counter. "I'm not, you know," she said, so quietly that it took a moment for her words to register.

"Excuse me?"

"Always right. I'm not."

"Well, Marissa, I--"

Hand and sponge came up to stop Gary. Marissa looked a bit sheepish. "The thing is, I didn't sleep all that well, either. And I did a lot of thinking, and--what you said on the El last night, I think you hit the nail on the head. You already made this choice a long time ago, because it's who you are--someone who cares about all kinds of people." She waved the sponge. "From presidents and plane passengers right down to homeless kids. What you just told me about meeting Lucius Snow proves it. Obviously he cared about--" The corners of her mouth lifted. "--about sparrows, or he wouldn't have been there to help you and Andy. Who knows how many other lives you've saved just by saving Lucy and Bernardo--the consequences will echo for a long time, long after you and I are gone. Maybe you just needed the time to get really involved with someone like Lucy to be reminded that what you've done in the past three years, and the way you've gone about it, matters, regardless of what's happened in the rest of the world."

He sighed, and something in his heart that had been winding tighter and tighter since New Year's eased. Though he was grateful to his friend, Gary didn't have a response. He decided that maybe it was time to leave the lofty realms of speculation and get back down to business. "Where does the fry pan--"

Marissa smiled, understanding, and pointed. "Left of the stove."

"Speaking of changing things--what are we going to--"

"Mrreeow." The cat had crept up behind Gary, startling him so that he dropped the pan on the floor. There was a giggle from the doorway, and Gary turned to find Bernardo grinning at him.

"Cat wants you. Got milk?"

"Uh, gee, Bernardo, thanks for the heads up." Gary knew what the cat was after, and it wasn't a calcium fix. He stepped over to the table and picked up the paper. "Now what?"

"Bernardo! _Wishbone_ is on." The boy spun on his heel and ran back to the living room.

Marissa waited for a moment, but when Gary didn't say anything, she went back to washing the dishes. Gary stood before the table, paper open between his spread hands, absorbed not only in the story he'd found on page four, but in his thoughts, in calculations, in wondering if he was right.

If the paper...if the universe...was really bending to his will.

There was only one way to know for sure. But he had to be prepared.

"Hey, uh, 51st and Kedzie, that's near your church, isn't it?"

"A few blocks away. Why?" Marissa asked carefully. "Busy day?"

He told her.

"That's the only thing in the paper? A hit and run leaves an unidentified woman who was getting out of a taxi in a coma?"

"That and Jeff's snow sculptures, yeah." Gary turned to the front page, peering at the photos and trying to determine the angle of the sun. If he was right...

"You have to stop it."

"I know that, Marissa."

"What time?"

"Soon, but not right away. Can I use your phone?"

She nodded, and he picked up the handset from the wall-mounted unit.

"What about McGinty's? There are deliveries due today, two day's worth, actually, and the roads are so much better; people will expect us to be open."

"I know, we'll have to--" Gary turned his attention to the woman who'd answered his call. "Uh, yeah, Miguel Diaz, please."

"What does he have to do with it?" Marissa's brow furrowed, while the voice on the other end of the line told Gary that Miguel was on assignment.

"He is? Do you know where?" A pause, some conversation in the bullpen, and Gary was told that Diaz was shooting in "some park somewhere."

It was, as Crumb used to say, close enough for government work.

"Okay." Gary hung up the phone. "Okay, look, I've gotta go to the park first. Miguel speaks Spanish, he can help me talk to this lady and..."

"Whoa." Marissa waved the dishtowel she'd been using to dry off the counter. "For the sake of those of us who don't have a program, do you want to explain what's going on?"

Moving to the sink, Gary checked back over his shoulder to be sure the kids were still absorbed in the television show. He bent close and whispered, "Marissa, this lady, I'm pretty sure she's their mom."

"What?"

"I think saw her yesterday at your church."

"The lady in the article?"

"Well, I don't know, there's not a picture, but it says she was fairly young, Hispanic, and it's the same neighborhood."

"And how many people in that neighborhood fit that description, Gary? It's not all that close to the address Lucy gave us."

"But this woman, Marissa--she was Catholic, for one thing. She was praying with a rosary. And she had hair kinda like Lucy's, and--" He stood up straight, remembering. "Her coat! It had patches on the elbows, the same fabric as Lucy's shirt."

"Are you sure?"

"I'm pretty sure."

Her eyes widened. "You'd better--"

"--get Miguel," they finished together. They both started for the living room, but Gary put a hand on Marissa's shoulder.

"We shouldn't say anything to them yet."

"No. If it isn't her, it will break their hearts." Marissa rubbed the back of her neck for a moment, thinking. "I guess I'll take them into work with me."

"You think that's a good idea?"

She shrugged. "Why not? They'll probably be more help than you are, most of the time." They hurried through the living room, where Bernardo was on the floor, sharing the pillow Gary'd used the night before with Reilly. The boy was fixated on the television program, which seemed to center on a little dog in a Sherlock Holmes outfit. For Reilly's sake, Gary hoped Bernardo wasn't getting any ideas. Lucy was curled on the couch with Cat, stroking it from head to tail. She wasn't lost in the program, though; her questioning gaze followed Gary through the room and out into the foyer. The weak smile he flashed her as he passed was the only explanation he felt capable of making.

"So," he asked Marissa when they were out of the kids' line of sight, "I'll meet you at McGinty's in an hour or so, or at least I'll call when I figure out what's going on?"

Stopping next to the coat tree, Marissa nodded. She fingered Lucy's worn canvas overcoat. "Maybe I'll stop along the way and get them something warmer to wear."

"Yeah." Gary grinned and reached for his hat. "Like you said, it wouldn't be smart to get too attached."

"I just don't want them to freeze to death, that's all. And besides," she added with an answering smile, "I never said that I was smart."

"Where are you going?" Lucy stood in the doorway, hands on her hips. When Gary didn't, couldn't, answer, she turned to Marissa. "Where is he going?"

"There's something Gary has to do, Lucy."

She whirled on Gary. "You said you were going to find my mom. You promised!"

It would be better to have her angry now than later. "I need to do something first," he reiterated, pulling on his coat. Bad idea--it was still damp. He shrugged it back off, trading it for the extra sweatshirt. Not the world's greatest fashion statement, but it kept him from having to look Lucy in the eye. "When I get done, then we'll talk about finding your mom, okay?"

Lucy's scowl deepened. "I guess."

"Look, I promised to help find your mom, and I will. But you gotta promise me something, too." He recalled what Marissa had said earlier about Lucy needing an adult to take charge. "For right now, you go with Marissa, and do what she tells you. No running away, no talking back." Gary took a deep breath, and looked her right in the eye. "I'm not gonna let you down, Lucy. Can you hold up your end of the bargain?"

Arms folded over her chest, Lucy glanced at Marissa, her expression softening, the lines around her mouth disappearing. She turned back to Gary. "Yeah."

"Promise?"

Lucy nodded. "I promise."

"I'm gonna hold you to that."

But it was his own promise that followed Gary out the door like an anxious, hovering ghost.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~


	12. Chapter 12

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

_We felt like red balloons set adrift_  
 _over the wide sky of this new land._  
 _Little by little we lost our will to connect,_  
 _and stopped collecting anything heavier_  
 _to carry than a wish._  


~ Judith Ortiz Cofer

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

The morning sun was bright, but not warm; its only purpose seemed to be to create an annoying glare that made Gary wish for his sunglasses. After what had certainly been a sleepless night for city maintenance crews, the streets were drivable, and traffic was heavier than it had been the day before. If he'd had his jeep at Marissa's, Gary might have simply driven to the scene of the accident on his own. But he didn't just want to save this woman's life. He wanted to communicate with her, and maybe, just maybe, set the world right--if only for a couple of lost kids.

Catching those sparrows would be more than enough for him.

He found Miguel Diaz in the park, as he'd hoped. Kneeling in the snow, face pressed against his clicking, whirring camera, the photographer muttered under his breath as Gary approached. Gary didn't know if it was good muttering or bad muttering. He cleared his throat.

"Uh--Miguel?"

The camera clicked a couple more times before Gary was acknowledged. "Hey, Hobson." Graceful as a cat, Miguel got to his feet, brushing snow from his jeans. "Nice get up." He nodded judiciously, jutting out his lower lip as his appraising glance took in Gary's bulky sweater/sweatshirt combo, leather gloves, red scarf, and navy stocking cap.

"Oh, well, I kinda got my coat wet last night." Gary cast a glance back to the trees and the pond; everything seemed quiet. "Haven't had time to go home and pick up another one."

Miguel's mouth curved into a sly grin. "I can see why. The ladies really go for the layered look, don't they? And that five o'clock shadow--verrrry sexy. Who was she?"

"She's eleven, and get your mind out of the gutter. It's a long story," Gary added when the photographer's eyes widened.

Miguel shook his head. "One of these days, Hobson, I'm actually going to figure you out." He gestured at the snow sculptures. "Thanks for the tip. I gotta say, it's not what I would have expected from you. Since when are you an art critic?"

"Uh, since never, actually," Gary admitted, stamping his boots to keep out the seeping cold. "I know the guy who did them, and I thought they'd make good copy, or whatever you call it, for the paper."

"Yeah, well, don't think I didn't check around for explosives first." Miguel walked over to the troll and peered through his lens, turning the camera and moving back and forth until he had the best angle. Gary followed, noting all the footprints that hadn't been there the afternoon before--some of them his, more of them a good deal smaller.

"Very funny. Look, I--uh--do you have your car here?"

The camera came away from Miguel's face. Under his heavy brow, his eyes narrowed. "Why are you asking?"

"I--uh--" Gary had been rubbing his hands together for warmth; now he spread them wide, palms up. "I need your help."

"Oh, man!" Miguel grabbed his narrow-brimmed black hat from his head and slapped it against his thigh. "I knew there was a catch!"

"No, it's not like that. When I called you yesterday, I didn't know--" There was such a world of things that Gary hadn't known then that he wasn't sure where to begin. He drew in a deep breath and tried to start everywhere at once. "Something's come up, something important, and I need you, because you speak Spanish, and I don't, and there's a lady in trouble, and her kids, too, and it's kinda far from here, and there's--there's probably a great story in there somewhere--"

Chuckling, Miguel held up a hand. "Whoa, whoa, slow down. You talk more than my last girlfriend."

"Well, this is important, okay? I gotta get down to the south side soon if I'm gonna help this lady, and I don't think I can--look, can I just tell you on the way?"

Miguel turned back to the troll, aiming his camera again. "I have to finish up here, and then find the guy who made them and get some info. Then we can go."

"No." Gary grabbed the other man's arm, pulled him up, and swung him around so they were face-to-face. He let all his own tension and panic, everything that had been building since talking to Lucy that morning, show in his eyes. "Now." Miguel stared at him in stupefied wonder. The guy probably thought he was nuts. Gary took a deep breath, released the photographer's arm. "Look, like I said, I know the artist. I can hook you up with him, but this is gonna be an even bigger story if you just come with me, if you'd trust me--"

Miguel snorted and shook his head. "Whatever you do, man, don't say that."

"What?"

"'Trust me.' Whenever you say that, I end up regretting it. Since meeting you--" He stuck a finger in Gary's face for every item-- "I've nearly lost my job--more than once--nearly lost my life, nearly been blown up..." But he was looking Gary right in the eye now, and something must have registered. Stalking toward his car, screwing on the camera's lens cap, he resumed his litany. "Nearly been blown up, nearly thrown in jail--"

Gary hurried along behind him, one gloved hand held out. "Nearly, see, that's the key word."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. Tell me on the way. But then you gotta help me find the guy who made all this."

"No problem."

"Okay, Deep Throat." Miguel unlocked the brown Plymouth parked at the entrance to the playground. "Let's go."

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ 

Even though it was rush hour all over the city, the neighborhood to which Gary directed Miguel was quiet. Houses in various stages of disrepair, with an occasional three or four story box of an apartment building thrown in for good measure, lined the narrow, treeless streets. The cars parked against the curb, most of them at least ten years old, made it harder to negotiate, especially in the snow. Miguel pulled over as far as he could to let an ancient station wagon get past, then eased back out into the narrow section that had been plowed down the middle of the street.

"Well," he said, his sweeping glance taking in the block, "we're here. You want to tell me exactly what we're looking for?"

Gary had explained the bare bones; that he'd run into a couple of runaway kids, and thought their mom might be down in this neighborhood. He'd left out most of the details, unsure that he could even bring himself to repeat them. "Who. Inez Savaria. I hope."

"You hope? What the hell does that mean?"

"I told you, she might be--there!" Gary's pointing finger jammed up against the windshield when Miguel slammed on the brakes. In the intersection just ahead, a taxi had come to a halt, a woman emerging from the passenger's side. Gary's heart sped up when he recognized the woman from the church the night before; not so much her face, which he hadn't seen, but her coat, with those patches on the elbows, the same blue-checked fabric as Lucy's shirt.

He was out of the car before Miguel could finish asking, "How do you know?" As Gary approached the intersection, he could hear the woman's desperate pleading, though he couldn't make out a word of what she was saying. It had to be her, it had to...the thought repeated itself to the rhythm of Gary's pounding feet.

She was hanging on to the partly-open passenger's side door of the battered old yellow cab, her bent posture and animated head-bobbing conveying distress. Gary's approach brought him up on the cabbie's side of the vehicle, and he heard the driver's voice first.

"Lady, I don't know what you want, but unless you show me some money, I'm calling the cops!"

"Hey." Gary tapped on the window, and the driver, a bald, narrow-eyed, giant of a man, rolled it down an inch or so. "What's the problem?"

"You want a ride?" The driver was already reaching for the meter. "Get right on in. I got no time for this deadbeat."

"She's not a deadbeat." Gary glanced across the roof of the cab at the wide-eyed, desperate woman.

"Right, like you would know. We've been going around in circles for half an hour, something about looking for her kids--I mean, I barely even speak Spanish, so I don't know what she's jawing about, and then she said she didn't have any more money--and she wants me to keep going! What do I look like, some kind of charity foundation?"

Gary had stopped paying attention to the cabbie. He was staring at the woman, and his relief knew no bounds--he'd been right. He recognized her eyes. Lucy's eyes, last night when she'd been having that nightmare, had looked exactly like that. There were other resemblances--high cheekbones, smooth brown skin, delicate nose--separate details, but a single impression that was all the confirmation Gary needed.

He fumbled with his wallet as Miguel approached and stopped next to the driver's door. "Hobson? What's up?"

Gary threw a couple of tens through the crack in the window. "This guy says--"

\--and then he heard it, the squeal of spinning tires, a car out of control on the hard-packed snow. No time to think, he vaulted over the hood of the taxi, heedless of the cabbie's protest, yelling at Miguel to stay back.

He cleared the hood and the woman turned a frightened, baffled face to the specter of a crazy stranger barreling toward her. Skidding around the door, Gary grabbed for her waist as a fishtailing Pinto squealed into the intersection, taking dead aim at the passenger's side of the cab. He heard Miguel shout a warning; he took two more running steps, dragging the woman with him. The Pinto was coming closer, closer--he could feel the heat of its grill, and they were still between it and the cab. Without releasing the woman, Gary jumped.

By some miracle, they landed in a corner snowbank. A metallic screech sliced through the air as the taxi's passenger door was shorn off, followed by a deep "thump" when the Pinto smashed into another pile of snow. Gary didn't see it happen. His face was buried in the filthy drift.

"Hobson! Hey, what the hell--how did you--" Gloved hands pulled Gary to his feet. Eyes wide and incredulous, Miguel asked, "You okay?"

Gary spat snow out of his mouth, brushed it out of his eyes, and wondered why this couldn't have happened in oh, say, June or something. "I'm fine." He reached down to help the woman to her feet; her arm shook under his guiding touch. "Look, Miguel, you gotta talk to her." Gary shivered as the snow that had been lodged in the neck of his sweater when he slid into the drift glided down his back. He glanced back at the intersection.

The cab driver was standing a few yards away, staring in disbelief, first at the door, then at Gary, then back at the Pinto. "Son of a--" he muttered. The Pinto's driver climbed out the passenger's side of his car, since the driver's side was jammed into the snowbank. Gary knew he should go check it out, make sure that they were all right, but in the original article the only one who'd been injured was the woman, and she was his main concern.

Miguel was speaking to her in Spanish, and, gasping for air, hands trembling as she pointed to the cab, she was trying to answer. Up close, Gary could see that she was younger than he'd expected; maybe thirty, but maybe not even that yet, despite the careworn lines on her face.

"Is she all right?"

The photographer glanced at Gary and shrugged. "She seems to be. Just scared to death. You wanna tell me what's going on?"

"Ask her her name."

"But Hobson, how did you know about the car? I mean, it all happened so fast I didn't even have time to get my lens cap off. The least you could have done--"

"Find out her _name_ , Diaz!" In his impatience to get to the bottom of things, Gary was about ready to shake the photographer.

At that moment, however, the cabbie came over and poked him in the shoulder. "What's the big idea, buddy? This is all your fault, you know."

Gary gaped at him. " _My_ fault?"

Miguel turned from the woman for a moment. "Hey, get it straight. If he hadn't jumped over your cab like that, she'd have been right in the path of that car and you'd be looking at accessory to murder charges!"

Gary stared at the photographer in stunned disbelief. Murder? There was no way--but the driver seemed to buy it; he backed down, his expression changing from anger to befuddlement.

"But..."

"Miguel Diaz, _Sun-Times_." He whipped out his wallet like a gunslinger drawing his weapon, flipped it open, and handed the driver a business card. "I'm your eyewitness here. Who do you think the cops are going to believe? You want to give a statement to the press now or should we wait for your arraignment? I mean, what is your problem, anyway? This woman's trying to find a couple of lost kids and you won't help her? I'll tell you what the story's gonna be on you, you--"

Gary glanced behind him, and saw the woman running away, down the street, coat billowing behind her. "Damn! Miguel!"

They both took off after her, leaving the cab driver gawking. It wasn't hard to catch up; she was in worn flats and they were wearing sneakers, and the sidewalks were in worse shape than the street. Miguel was a few feet behind him, cradling his camera to his chest. "Inez!" Gary called, hoping, knowing he was right. "Inez Savaria!"

Without stopping, she looked back at him, an expression of total fear on her face.

"Hobson, how--" Miguel began again, but by then Gary had caught up with the frightened woman, grabbing her arm.

"Just wait--Inez, please." She was struggling to get free. "Tell her we don't want to hurt her, for God's sake."

Puffing to a halt next to Gary, Miguel drew in a breath and then spoke words of reassurance. Inez, her gaze darting from one man to the other, asked a question that caused the photographer to break out into a wide, reassuring grin.

"No, no!" He shook his head emphatically, held up his camera as he explained something, pointing to Gary with a shrug. The woman relaxed, but Gary didn't let go of her arm. "She thinks we're immigration officials or something," Miguel told him.

"No." Gary wagged his head back and forth. "No, not that. Tell her I want to help her. Tell her--tell her I know where her kids are. That's what she was doing in the cab, trying to find her kids; she was desperate, she didn't have any money, tell her I know that, but everything's okay, her kids are all right."

"Okay--" But Miguel didn't get a chance to translate; Gary was too concerned about getting the whole story to Inez Savaria before she took off on them again.

"They're with a friend of mine. They've had a rough couple weeks, but they want to see her, they miss their mom a lot. Tell her that they're okay, that Lucy and Bernardo are okay."

He didn't need a translator for that one. Inez twisted in his grip, her eyes wide as she grabbed at Gary's sleeves. "Lucia? Bernardo?"

Breaking into a broad smile, Gary nodded, looking her right in the eye. "Tell her, Miguel, tell her they're all right, that we can take her to them."

The other man shook his head, mouth twisted in exasperation. "Geez. You got a lot of 'splainin' to do, Lucy," he told Gary in a perfect imitation of Ricky Ricardo. There was one word in there that Inez understood, and she latched onto it with a fierce eagerness, tightening her grip on Gary's sleeves.

"¿Sí, Lucy, dónde Lucia es?"

Miguel took a deep breath, then launched into an explanation that Gary really wished he could follow. Inez's eyes filled with tears, she released her grip on Gary to brush them away, and for the first time, he allowed himself to relax, just a little. It really was going to work out.

"Ask her if she trusts us, if she'll come with us."

"Hobson, you're talking about her kids." Miguel nodded at Inez. "Look at that face. If you told her to jump off Navy Pier and swim to Michigan, she'd do it. Let's go."

They hurried back to the intersection, Inez reaching for Gary's arm when she slipped on the ice. The taxi--except for its door--had been moved out of the middle of the street, and the Pinto's driver was busy apologizing profusely to the cabbie. "Let 'em at it," Miguel said. "I gave him my card, so if he wants a witness, the cops can call me." He grinned a lopsided grin. "I got another story to take care of here." Gary was grateful; he didn't know how long the police would take to arrive, and he was pretty sure they would spook the woman who was trotting next to him with hungry, pleading eyes.

Unnoticed by the pair in the intersection, the three piled into the Plymouth, Gary in the backseat so Miguel could keep talking to Inez. Gary wanted to be sure he had the story straight. "Ask her about Diego Linares," he demanded. "Tell her she can't take those kids back there, that we'll find a better place for them, but there's no way--"

"Hobson." Miguel nodded in Inez's direction as he started the engine. Wide-eyed and frozen in place, she stared at Gary like a rabbit in the headlights of a semi.

God. He'd said that name.

"What is it?"

Swallowing hard, Gary told him, "This guy's been taking advantage of her since she showed up in Chicago. He's hurt her, hurt the kids, that's why they ran away." Gary remembered the awful look on Lucy's face when she'd asked if Diego had sent him to find her. "Tell her we don't know him, that she's safe with us."

Miguel relayed the information as he drove, but not without a couple of confused frowns in Gary's direction. Fear still filling her eyes, Inez stared from one man to the other. It must have taken a good deal of faith, however impulsive, for her to get in the car with a couple of strangers. Gary wasn't sure what was being said, but he heard "Bernardo", and "Lucy", and "Gary Hobson." The last was delivered with a thumb over Diaz's shoulder.

"What are you telling her?"

But Miguel didn't have a chance to answer; Inez had jumped in with a frantic stream of words; questions, from the uplift of her voice, and explanations, and the two began another extended conversation. Miguel's clipped tone indicated that he'd gone into interview mode. A few minutes later, Inez answered one last question, then stared out the side window, blinking hard. Miguel's mouth hardened into a firm line, and his eyes met Gary's in the rearview mirror.

"Shit, Hobson."

"Yeah," Gary agreed. He could guess what Inez Savaria had been telling the reporter. "That just about covers it, doesn't it?"

"Linares told her that if she told anyone about the way he treated her or the kids, he'd turn her in to the immigration authorities. He's convinced her she's in the country illegally, he took her papers, and the kids', and told her they were fakes. You know, he's probably using them to make copies, to sneak other people into the country and probably exploit them, too."

As far as Gary was concerned, that crime was secondary to terrorizing two innocent kids. "Well, tell her we'll get it sorted out."

"I already did--but that's not all. She took off, left him a couple of days ago, and she's been living on the streets, trying to find someone to help her look for her kids. She said she slept in a church somewhere around here last night. You know, if I ever meet this guy..." His voice trailed off, leaving tension in the air along with the implied threat.

"Yeah. Me too." Glancing out the window, Gary was surprised to see that they were already close to McGinty's. "Thanks for coming with me."

"Oh, don't thank me. Do you know what this means? This is Pulitzer stuff, man!" Miguel slammed his hand on the steering wheel, causing Inez to jump. "I got my story, and I didn't get shot at or blown up!"

Gary snorted. He could care less about immigration scandals. He was just glad he could get the Savaria family back together again, and..."Hey, Miguel, you're still gonna run the story about the sculptures, aren't you?" He figured he owed Jeff at least that much, and he didn't want the kid's work to get lost in the shuffle he had created.

"Oh, yeah, sure, I'll pass the film on to someone. Right now we got bigger fish to fry--good old fashioned social justice."

Frowning, Gary leaned back in the Plymouth's generous rear seat. He pulled the paper out of his back pocket to check on the front page, just to make sure that Jeff would get his due. Inez was peppering Miguel with more questions, so it was safe to sneak a look.

He didn't see what he expected. The snow sculptures were gone, but while Linares's name--and a picture, a mug shot--graced the front page, the story wasn't about an immigration scam.

It was about the world turning inside out.

About an altercation at an L station, north of downtown, in just the kind of low-key shopping area that a kind-hearted, practical person would go to in order to find coats for a couple of lost, cold kids.

About a boy screaming as a man matching the description of a convicted felon wrestled him away from the woman he'd been traveling with.

About the woman and a girl slipping off the icy platform and under the wheels of the departing train, right in front of a crowd of stunned witnesses.

"Miguel!" Gary threw himself forward, leaning over the front seat. Inez shrank back against the passenger door, but he didn't have time to be gentle. "Turn, turn left up here, damn it, _turn_!"

They screeched through a just-red light, blaring horns sounding in their wake. "This isn't the way to your bar, man."

"No, not McGinty's. We gotta get to the L stop on Clark, up by Diversy. We gotta get there _now_."

Astonished brown eyes met Gary's. "Now what? I thought you said you were gonna take this lady to see her kids."

"If we don't get there, it won't happen. That guy, Diego, he's going to find them first."

"Diego?" Inez grabbed Gary's arm, pulling at him. "Diego?"

"How do you know?"

Panic-stricken, Gary was ready to climb over the front seat and take the wheel himself. "I just know, damn it, _go_!"

"But you said the kids were with your friend," Miguel protested, even as their speed climbed, and he began weaving his way around slower traffic.

"They are." Gary shut his eyes against the afterimages of the story he'd just scanned. His voice rose over Inez's frantic questions. "Just go, will ya? Hurry!"

Miguel wagged his head in mock sorrow, even as he stomped on the accelerator. "I knew this was too good to be true."

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~


	13. Chapter 13

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

_Men have forgotten this truth, said the fox. But you must not forget it. You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed. You are responsible for your rose._

_I am responsible for my rose, said the little prince, so that he would not forget._

~ Antoine de Saint-Exupéry 

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

 

By the time they reached the L stop, Inez Savaria was completely confused and obviously scared out of her mind. She had retreated to the corner of her seat, shrinking into her coat and keeping a wary eye on the strangers. Gary didn't know what she was thinking, but he didn't want to tell her what lay ahead. He was sure the paper had shown him the story so that he could stop it, but still, he didn't want to make a promise he couldn't keep.

He'd already made promises--to Lucy, to Marissa--if he couldn't keep them, then he wouldn't deserve the paper.

If he couldn't keep them, then he didn't want to know the future. There wouldn't be one.

"Okay, so this is it, now what?"

"I gotta get up there."

Gary leapt from the car before Miguel had it parked. The L was rattling to a stop overhead. Trusting the others to follow, Gary flew up the stairs, jumped the turnstile despite the protest of the ticket-taker, and hoped like hell that she'd call security, or, better yet, the cops. He skidded to a halt on the wooden platform at the same time as the train. A handful of people emerged from various cars, their attention attracted, as was Gary's, by the raised voices coming through the open door of the car at the end of the platform.

"I'm telling you right now, lady, those are my kids, and if you don't let them come with me--"

"They are not your kids, and you wouldn't deserve them if they were!"

"And who's gonna stop me?" There was an edge of sneering disbelief in the question. " _You_?"

Gary could hear faint sobs as he hurried closer, and identified them as Bernardo's. Pushing through a growing crowd of the curious, he saw it, all of it, too clearly. Marissa was in the doorway of the car, her back to Gary, a step below a man with a medium build, wavy hair, and the eyes of a snake charmer. Lucy stood stiffly at her side, just a little behind. Bernardo clung to Marissa's arm, crying, and Reilly was in front of her, too busy growling at the man who presented the most immediate threat to the little group to warn his mistress that she was nearing the edge of the step, and that the platform below was slick with ice.

What Diego Linares said next froze Gary in his tracks. The surly lines on his face disappeared as he pleaded with Lucy. "You kids gotta come with me. Your mom is worried sick about you." He turned to Bernardo and repeated himself in Spanish.

Bernardo loosed his grip on Marissa's arm.

"No!" Marissa reached for him, but missed. "You have to trust Gary, he'll find your mom, don't trust this man, Bernardo, _don't_ \--"

But Gary saw what his friend couldn't; Diego had seized the boy's arm and pulled him in close. The warning ding of the closing doors sounded, igniting confusion and panic. Lucy screamed and lunged for her brother, and from somewhere behind him Gary heard Miguel calling him over a rising hum of excited voices. Marissa dropped Reilly's harness to grab Lucy, who had Bernardo by the back of his sweatshirt, while Diego Linares tugged at the boy's arm. Reilly was barking now, pushing himself between Marissa and the threatening situation, and her right foot slipped off the step.

Digging his heels into the ice, Gary closed the remaining distance; he reached out and caught Marissa with one arm as she fell, stretching out the other to block Lucy's backward tumble and slam the sliding door back open. If the door didn't close, the train wouldn't move, and no one would slide onto the tracks while he was around.

No one was going to take the boy, either.

"It's me," he told Marissa, his explanation and apology rolled into those two words as he yanked on her coat sleeve in a motion that swung her around and sent her sprawling on the platform--but not off it, not onto the tracks. Blocking the door with his foot and shoulder, Gary reached past Lucy and wrapped his arms around both her and her brother, pulling Bernardo out of Diego's grasp. He spun around, releasing the door as he jumped, his momentum carrying all three of them onto the platform beside Marissa. Tags jingled, and Reilly landed on Gary's ankles in a tangle of harness and limbs.

Both kids were squirming under Gary, and he rolled out of the way to let them up, getting himself even more twisted in Reilly and his gear. Lying on his back, he only had time to note that the train hadn't moved before Diego, who'd been thrown backward when Gary had pulled Bernardo out of his grip, leapt off the train--or tried to. He tripped on Reilly's lead and hit the icy patch elbow first, his feet sliding between the train and the platform. Gary struggled to untangle himself from the dog and reach him, but Miguel got there first, hauling Linares up by the lapel of his black leather coat, muttering something in Spanish with a look as dark as a thundercloud.

Diego glared at the photographer, then saw the cop who was pushing through the spectators, and turned back for the train, but Miguel didn't let go of his jacket.

"Hobson? This is the guy, right?"

Finally free, Gary staggered a bit as he stood. "Yeah, he's--"

"Bernardo?"

Gary spun around. On the edge of the crowd, Inez was on her knees, her hands over her mouth, as if not quite sure what she saw. The little boy didn't wonder at all; he scrambled to his feet and ran to her hugs and kisses. Keeping an eye on the pair, Gary helped Marissa to her feet.

"Sorry about that." He brushed snow and dirt off her coat while Reilly tried to get as close as he could to his mistress. "I didn't know how else to get make sure you didn't--that the kids didn't--" He gulped, repeating his mantra to himself: It hadn't happened, it hadn't happened...

Marissa's hand on Gary's arm was a little shaky, and she winced when she reached back down for Reilly's harness.

"Hey, are you hurt?"

"Bruised a little, I think, but I'll survive." She drew in a long breath, let it out slow. "Thank God you showed up."

"I was returning the favor, after last night. Where did this guy come from?"

She shook her head, her expression distressed. "I don't know, Gary. He could have been at any of the stops between here and my place; the kids were so excited about riding the L, and they were looking out the windows. He must have seen them from the platform, and then after the last stop he was there, right there, in our car, and he started in on the kids right away. I didn't know how I was going to stop him."

Gary wrapped an arm around her shoulders. He wasn't going to have Marissa come out of this thinking she couldn't handle it. "You were holding your own, just fine."

"But if you're here, then the paper--you were here because--what was going to happen?"

"Someone was going to get hurt," Gary hedged.

"Who someone?"

"Well, uh--you someones. All of you," he admitted. "But it was just a bit of ice," he said, "it wasn't anything you did. And if you want to think about what might have happened, then think about what it would have been like for Lucy and Bernardo if they'd met up with him without you, if they'd been all alone."

"What are you saying, Gary?"

His mouth twisted into a wry grin. "That maybe things happened this way for a reason."

Marissa reached up to squeeze his hand as she sighed. "There's something really wrong with that man. The kids froze up when he got on the train, and the air just went cold, everything felt all wrong."

It hadn't happened, it hadn't happened...

Gary glanced over to his right, where the cop was questioning Linares and Miguel, with outraged gestures, was trying to give half the answers. Then he looked at Lucy, still sitting alone on the platform, and thought about what could have happened, what _had_ happened for months. He took a step away from Marissa. He didn't intend to do anything stupid, but boy, did he want to give this guy a piece of his mind. "There's a cop over there with them. I should go see what's happening."

"Gary." Marissa's hand encircled his wrist. "Don't."

"I just wanna--"

Marissa nodded. "I know. But I would like to make sure the kids are all right, and meet Mrs. Savaria."

Gary closed his eyes just for a second, and followed her unspoken advice. Let it go. "Yeah. Okay."

Turning his attention to Lucy, he wondered why she hadn't gone to her mother. She sat on the platform in the same pose she'd adopted after her nightmare, knees drawn in and arms wrapped around her legs. Her gaze swiveled from the police officer talking to Miguel and Diego, to Bernardo and her mother, but she couldn't seem to move.

"I think we'd better talk to Lucy," Gary murmured, adding an explanation of what was happening, and Marissa nodded. Together they approached the girl, and Gary offered her a hand. One more glance around the platform, and she took it, letting him pull her to her feet.

"Your mom's here," Gary told her. Useless, stupid thing to say, but he didn't know what else to tell her. Her walls were back up, her face a shuttered house; she wrapped her arms tight around her torso, her only response a single nod.

Marissa's voice was gentle. "What's wrong, Lucy? Don't you want to go to her?"

Lucy didn't answer, just stared across what must have seemed like an ocean of space at the family she'd fought so desperately to defend. Inez had Bernardo's face in both hands, her own streaming with tears, asking him questions, and receiving nods and "Sí, Mama," in response. Finally, with a deep, deep sigh, the woman pulled him in close, looked up, and met her daughter's eyes. She got stiffly to her feet, clasping Bernardo's hand in her right and holding out her left in supplication.

"Lucy? Lucia, por favor..."

The girl just stared. Gary saw it all in her eyes--she wanted her mom, as badly as she had the night before, but she was afraid of what that meant, afraid that she'd have to go back to Diego Linares, afraid she'd be betrayed and left unprotected.

"Lucy," Gary said softly, one hand on the girl's shoulder, "your mom came here with me. She wasn't with him. I think that's why he was trying to get you back; because if you came back, then she would." He bent down to look her right in those huge, needy eyes. "But you don't have to go back, not ever." He nodded back toward the cop, whose frown was deepening as he looked from the still-yabbering Miguel Diaz to the shrinking, sullen man in front of him, and then over to the kids and their mother.

Lucy blinked. Bit her lip. Then asked a question in Spanish, barely loud enough for Gary to hear, but it was enough for her mom. Inez nodded. Lucy needed one careful step, then another, before she gave in and catapulted herself into her mother's waiting arms.

Gary heaved a huge sigh of relief, and turned to explain to Marissa, who was waiting patiently. Instead, Miguel hurried over, delivering a punch to Gary's shoulder. "Score one for the good guys, huh? They're gonna want us all down at the station house to sort everything out, but believe me, this Linares guy is toast. He's going down for a long time."

"Good."

"But I tell you, Hobson--" Miguel shook his head ruefully. "One of these days, you and me, we're gonna have a long talk. How you pulled that one off--the least you could have done was wait for me to get set up before you started yanking everybody out of the guy's clutches. Man, what a shot that would have made."

"This was not a photo opportunity," Gary told him firmly.

"Right, Superman. Don't think I'm as dumb as that Jimmy Olson kid. One of these days, I'll catch you putting on a cape, and it's gonna make my career."

"Miguel." Gary pointed at the trio in front of them, lost in their reunion. He didn't bother pointing out that he'd never be Superman, and had no intention of donning a cape. "There's your photo op."

"Yeah." Miguel's face softened into a grin as they watched Inez Savaria embrace both her children at once. He fingered the lens cap of his camera, but didn't remove it. "In a minute."

"Gary?" Marissa slipped her hand into his. "What's happening?"

"Everything's all right," he told her.

This time, it was true.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~


	14. Chapter 14

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

_I will pass, we will pass,_  
 _says the water,_  
 _and the truth sings against stone..._  
 _I will pass, we will pass._  
 _So sings night to day,_  
 _month to year._  
 _Time_  
 _corrects the testimony_  
 _of winners and losers,_  
 _but the tree never rests in its growing._  
 _The tree dies, another seedling comes_  
 _to life, and everything goes on._

~ Pablo Neruda

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ 

 

Given their relatively small roles in the portion of the drama in which the police were interested, it didn't take long for Gary, Marissa, and Miguel to give their statements. Inez, on the other hand, was holed up with the detectives and the translator in the one of the precinct offices for almost two hours. Eventually Marissa took the kids down to the break room to see if they could scrounge up lunch, while Gary reminded Miguel for the umpteenth time about putting the photographs of the snow sculptures in the paper.

"The guy hangs out at Luigi's Bistro--it's just down from the park. If Jeff isn't around, someone there ought to know where to find him. You can run these tomorrow, right?"

"It's do-able," Miguel told him. "Though I don't know why it matters to you." He draped an arm over the back of the bench on which he sat, shaking his head at Gary, who stood, tapping the back of one hand against the other as he watched the activity around them. "Gary Hobson, patron of artists and rescuer of tiny children."

Gary pivoted, pinning Miguel with a glare and a two-fingered point. "I already told you, you keep my name out of this."

Miguel held up one hand. "Yeah, yeah, I got it, Clark Kent. But one of these days, no more Mr. Nice Guy. You're just lucky the real story here is that dude Linares, and even he's just the tip of the iceberg. And I have the exclusive. No one in the press room's gonna believe this, man, this is gonna be _great_."

Gary didn't listen to the rest of the photographer's crowing. It wasn't scandals he cared about. He scanned the bullpen again, and located the only person in uniform who wasn't questioning suspects or victims. "Hey, Miguel. Civilian Aid, that means they aid civilians, right?"

"Not exactly, Hobson. They're civilians who--" But Gary was already headed toward the woman who sat idly tapping at her computer.

It took a little talking on Gary's part, a little flirting on Miguel's part, and, finally, one look at Bernardo, beaming and bouncing back into the bullpen with a carton of milk and a bag of chips, to convince the Aide to track Luis Savaria through DMV records. By the time Inez was done, they had an address and a phone number. There really was an Uncle Luis--and an Aunt Maria. They'd been married that summer and moved twice, ending up in Wilmett, so it was no wonder Lucy hadn't been able to find him in the phone book.

After a long, involved conversation with her brother-in-law, Inez handed the phone to Lucy, who listened a great deal and said very little. But when she hung up, she was smiling, albeit dazedly. She hugged her mother and walked over to where Gary and Marissa were standing. "He wants us. He sounds like my papa and he said he wants us to stay with him for a while. In his house." Her eyes were bright with tears and wonder.

"Of course he wants you," Marissa told her. "You're his family."

Lucy didn't seem to have a reply for that, but when Gary smiled at her, trying to second what Marissa had said, she grinned back, and he saw the same happy light in her face that had been there when she'd described El Salvador. He knew what it meant.

Lucy was going home.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ 

Gary was at the bar sipping coffee, reading the _Sun-Times_ , and thinking the place was entirely too quiet, when Marissa arrived the next morning, Reilly leading the way. A swirl of cold air accompanied them; Gary had a cup of coffee waiting when Marissa slid onto the stool next to his.

"So, what's on tap for today?" she asked without preamble. "Any world crises to avert?"

"I hope not." Gary picked up the paper again, scanning headlines back into the Metro section. "I was thinking along the lines of something closer to home."

She took a sip of the coffee, tilted her head to one side. "I got a phone call this morning from Maria Savaria. I know we only met them for a couple minutes, but I like them. I think they're just what those kids need. Luis seems so relieved to have them here. I guess when he heard about his brother's death, he went to Missouri to try to find Inez, but she'd already moved on. He's been trying to track them down for months. And his wife loves the kids already; I can hear it in her voice."

Gary leaned against the back of his stool, one elbow on the bar. The reunion at the police station had happened so quickly that he hadn't had time to form much of an impression, but one or two images remained in his mind. "Yesterday Lucy looked at her like she was some kind of movie star or something--totally in awe. Why'd she call you? Is everything okay?"

"Everything's fine. They called because they're coming back into the city today. Inez needs to talk to some of the people down at the immigration office, and then Maria's taking her shopping. She asked if they could leave the kids with us."

"So much for not getting involved," Gary said with a wry shake of his head.

"Don't look at me." Marissa settled both elbows on the polished wood of the bar, smiling to herself as she cradled the warm mug in her hands. "Apparently it was Lucy's idea."

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ 

Early that afternoon, returning from a run-in with a postal carrier and an enraged dachshund, Gary found Marissa and their charges ensconced in the office. While Marissa worked at the computer, Lucy sat on the sofa, reading to Bernardo from an oversized picture book. Cat was curled up in her lap. Both children wore clothes that actually fit them, Gary saw with relief--warm sweaters and jeans and shiny new tennis shoes.

Whether Bernardo was getting much from the story was unclear. He sat on the floor, back against the sofa, coloring in an empty ledger. The tale involved two children trying to save England from an infestation of dragons, and it sounded kind of old-fashioned to Gary. He stood in the doorway listening for a few minutes before anyone noticed his presence. Lucy had paused to show her brother one of the illustrations, and when she looked up from the book and saw Gary, she broke into a shy smile. Bernardo waved a green crayon. "Hola, Gary!"

"Hola," he said to the group in general. He hung up his parka and headed for his desk.

"Everything okay?" Marissa asked.

He glanced down at the tiny toothmarks in the toe of his left boot, but decided they really weren't worth mentioning. "Yup. No blood shed, and Mr. Swanson's gonna get his Social Security check."

"Good."

Lucy resumed reading, and Gary plopped into his swivel chair, shaking his head at the mail and paper work that was already waiting for him. It was amazing how fast the stuff accumulated. Kind of like snow on a January night.

"Can you sign the payroll checks?" Marissa was entering figures from the Braille bank statements. "They're on your desk, left hand side."

"Sure." But Gary had swiveled his chair so he could see the kids, and for the moment the checks went unsigned.

"A whole flight of green dragons rose from the field," Lucy read, "and sprawled away across the sky. The children could hear the rattle of wings as they flew.

"'Oh, I want to go home,' said Effie." Showing the next illustration, Lucy snorted. "What a baby." But she flushed when Gary cleared his throat.

Bernardo put down his green crayon and peered at the drawing. "Dat's dragon?"

"That's _a_ dragon," Lucy said, her neat braids bobbing as she nodded and returned to the text. "'Don't be silly,' said Harry. 'People who are going to be their country's deliverers never scream and say they want to go home.'"

Bernardo frowned.

"'And are we,' asked Effie--'deliverers, I mean?'

"'You'll see,' said her brother, and on they went." Lucy stopped again, looking down; her own brother was poking her in the knee with his crayon.

"Lucy, what's dat?"

"What's what?"

"De-deliv-sers."

"Deliverers. It's--" Lucy's brow furrowed. "Marissa, what does it mean, exactly?"

Marissa didn't miss a beat, and Gary realized that she'd been listening in, too. "A deliverer is someone who saves someone else. Like Moses in the Bible. Do you know about Moses?"

Lucy nodded. "He saved the people from the Pharaoh. And like Harriet Tubman and the slaves. You got it, Nardo? A deliverer is a person who saves other people."

Bernardo's eyes lit up with understanding as he grinned at Gary, then at his sister. "Lucy!"

"Hmm?" She was busy trying to find her place again.

"No, Lucy." He poked her again with his crayon. "Lucy--you deliver."

Lucy's face twisted into a scowl. "Don't be silly. Moses saved the Israelites. That means a lot of people." She traced a circle in the air with one hand, as if to lasso the tribes of Israel, then pointed at the book. "And Effie and Harry want to save all of England from the dragons."

"Sí. You saved me."

"'Nardo, don't be--"

"He's right," Gary told her quietly.

Lucy stared at him for a minute with all the exasperation she could muster, but he refused to back down. From her lap, Cat blinked sleepy, wise eyes. Finally, she sighed and looked back down at the book. "When they came to St. George's Church they found the door open and they walked right in..." Her brow was still furrowed, but there was a smile playing at the corners of her mouth. Bernardo's nod as he picked up a blue crayon was satisfied.

Neither Gary nor Marissa got much work done as they listened to Lucy read about how the children found the controls to England's weather and used the cold and rain to rid the country of the pestilence of dragons. It was kind of a silly story, but listening to Lucy tell it made up for that. There was something captivating about her voice, Gary thought; it had a rhythm and music of its own. Bernardo colored furiously the whole time, stopping only when Lucy read:

"So then they turned on the hail--only half on, for fear of breaking people's windows--and after a while there were no more dragons to be seen moving. Then the children knew that they were indeed the deliverers of their country."

"Yes. Bueno, Lucy." Bernardo punctuated his pronouncement by clapping both hands down on the ledger.

"But it's not done yet."

"Delivers. Dragons are all gone."

"Deliver _ers_."

"Sí." Bernardo handed Lucy one of the sheets he'd colored, then took another one over to Gary, who blinked in surprise at the picture--a man standing next to a Ferris Wheel, the man taller than the ride, with a blue coat and stocking cap. He risked a glance at Lucy. Surprise, pleasure, and embarrassment were all written on her face. She held a drawing of a stick girl with long black hair standing triumphantly atop a mass of green, its triangular yellow wings identifying it as a dragon.

"De-liv-er- _ers_ ," Bernardo declared with an emphatic nod for each syllable.

He had one more piece of paper in his hand, and he took a step toward Marissa's desk, but then he turned back and held the paper out to Gary, shrugging helplessly. That kid could say more with one expressive shoulder lift than most people could with a paragraph.

"Hmmm..." Gary's eyes narrowed in solemn reflection. The third drawing had Marissa standing next to a bright yellow stick Reilly, with a roly-poly boy in a blue sweatshirt riding on the dog's back. "Did you press hard with the crayon?" he asked in a stage whisper, pantomiming the motion. Bernardo nodded, his face equally serious. "Well, that's easy then. You give it to Marissa, and she can feel the crayon lines,"--again, Gary demonstrated--"and you can tell her all about it."

Breaking into a relieved grin, Bernardo trotted over to Marissa, who made a huge fuss over the picture. Lucy finished the book in silence, closed it, and frowned at the cover and her drawing.

"What's up?" Gary asked her, turning his chair around to face her directly. "Didn't like the ending after all?"

"It wasn't fair." Lucy pursed her lips. "They saved their whole country from the dragons, and nobody ever knew it was them, except their parents."

"Hmm." Gary rested an elbow on the arm of his chair, chin in his hand. "What did their parents do?"

She set the book aside and stroked Cat from head to tail, staring down at the orange and ginger pattern of its fur. "Their mother sent them to bed and their father complained that they didn't save him a little dragon for his collection."

"It's rough being the good guy sometimes," Gary admitted, wondering what this was really about. "It doesn't mean that they did the wrong thing, though, does it?"

"And they know," Marissa contributed; Gary glanced gratefully over his shoulder at his friend, who was holding Bernardo in her lap. "They know what they did, and they can always be proud of that. That's what really matters."

"I guess so." Lucy traced the outline of the girl in the picture Bernardo had drawn for her.

All of this was hitting a bit close to home, giving Gary a mild case of the willies. Maybe the kids needed some grounding as well.

"Hey," he asked, "you want a Coke or something?"

Lucy blinked up at him. "Really?"

"Sure. Just tell whoever's out at the bar that I said it was okay."

"Me, too!" Bernardo jumped from Marissa's lap to join his sister. Apparently Coke was a word he knew. Lucy still had his drawing in her hand as they walked out the door.

A few minutes passed while Gary picked up a pen, but didn't get to the checks. Instead he stared at Cat, draped over the edge of the sofa in boneless relaxation.

"What is it?" Marissa asked.

"What?"

"Oh, come on, Gary, I can hear your brain whirring all the way over here. What's on your mind?"

Gary tapped the pen against the stack of checks. It was almost scary to put what he'd been thinking about all day into words. "Marissa, do you think she's--that Lucy is--well, that she's next?"

"Next?"

"To get the paper."

For the first time in his life, Gary was graced with the picture of a speechless Marissa Clark. Her posture, her hair, everything about her looked as unruffled as ever, but she couldn't respond. Her lips started to form one of the "W" questions, but no sound came out.

"Yeah, I know," he told her, vaguely satisfied at the reaction. About time someone else around here got weirded out.

"Why do you say that?" Marissa finally asked. Her eyes were still huge.

He traded the pen for a large paper clip, unbending it and twisting it into a spiral around the tip of his little finger. "It kinda makes sense. I mean, if Lucius Snow really was the guy at that pond, and then I hauled Lucy out..." He sighed. "I just hope I haven't, you know, put the whammy on her or something."

"The whammy?" Marissa's face relaxed into a smile. "I don't think that's in your hands Gary." There was a thoughtful pause that told him she was taking him seriously, then she murmured, "She certainly has the heart for it, though."

"But she's just a kid, with her whole life in front of her."

"So were you, once. And it hasn't turned out so badly, has it?"

"But--"

"Gary! Gary!" Bernardo dashed into the office and grabbed Gary by the hand, trying to pull him out of the chair, jumping up and down. "Come--come--" The kid was so excited he could hardly breathe. "'Rissa, too!"

"Okay, buddy, it's all right. We're coming." Bernardo was now pulling on Marissa's arm, and Gary stepped over to help her up.

"What's going on?"

"I have no idea."

Bernardo dragged them to the front windows, where Lucy was already peering through the mottled glass. "What's up?" Gary asked, but she pushed him toward the foyer.

"We have to go outside and see."

"Coats first." Marissa was already headed back toward the office to get hers. She returned within seconds, handing Bernardo's coat to Gary, and the handful of customers in the bar paused in their conversations to smile at the sight of the owner trying to stuff an overexcited, bouncy four-year-old into a bright yellow parka. The boy ran to the front door and back three times in the time it took Lucy and Gary to get into their own coats.

"Okay." Gary held doors as they pushed through the foyer and into the cold, bright day. "What's the big--oh."

All the snow drifts and plow piles were gone from Franklin Street. They'd been drafted into use for an elaborate sculpture that bore the unmistakable mark of its artist, who stood just off the curb, beaming, with his friends.

"Jeff?"

"Hey, Gary. I wasn't quite done yet, I mean, I still need to get some water on it to make sure it doesn't fall apart, but--you like it?"

"Well." Gary stepped off the curb to join him, shaking his head, not quite believing what he was seeing. "People are going to have to walk in the street to get around it, but--well, yeah, of course I like it, it's just--why?"

Luke and Rob laughed; even Trini, who looked a little more bright-eyed than she'd been before, smiled at Gary. Lucy and Bernardo had led Marissa over to the structure, and the three were exploring it with their hands. Jeff watched them for a moment, pride radiating from the tips of his spiky hair to the toes of his boots. Finally, he pulled a rolled-up newspaper, the current day's edition of the _Sun-Times_ , from his back pocket.

"Because of this. Man, I couldn't have asked for better publicity." He held up the familiar photos for Gary to see, and Gary pasted a surprised look on his face. "I've already got a call from a gallery that wants to sponsor a show, can you believe that? Anyway, the guy who did the story, he told me you sent him--then he told me what happened yesterday with the kids and their mom, and I thought--well, I didn't have any other way to--you know." He waved his hand at his creation.

"I think I do." Gary was still overwhelmed.

"Gary?" Marissa called. "What exactly is this?"

Jeff followed him over to join Marissa and the kids, while the others watched from the curb. "This is a giant hand," Gary told her, guiding her own fingers over the contours of the sculpture. "It's kinda sticking out of the sidewalk, like this." He positioned Marissa's hand, palm up, fingers curling in a little.

"What's it holding?"

Gary pulled her hand closer and let her touch the delicate object perched in the palm. "You tell me."

"El pájaro! Bird!" Bernardo couldn't keep quiet any longer. He jumped up and down, flapping his arms.

"It is indeed a bird." Marissa broke into a smile as she touched the outlines of wings and a beak. "What kind of bird is it?"

"Any kind you want it to be." Jeff shrugged. "I just put the first thing that came into my head there. I didn't really think it out that much."

Yeah, right. Gary shot him a raised eyebrow, and caught the kid flushing behind his rainbow scarf.

"It's a robin," Lucy declared. She'd walked all the way around the sculpture twice, and her eyes were shining.

"Bobin?" asked Bernardo.

"No." Marissa straightened up and squeezed Gary's hand. "No, it's a sparrow."

"Sparrow, robin, pterodactyl--who cares, man, it's _cold_ out here!" Luke stood just behind Jeff, bouncing on his toes. "I'm freezing my--uh--" He realized that Lucy was watching him. "--my toes off," he finished lamely.

Gary regarded the collection of people around him--different ages, different colors, different pasts, different futures--and yet, somehow, right now they all belonged together. He nodded at the front door. "Well, don't stand out here freezing, c'mon inside."

Half an hour later, he and Marissa were filling a tray with mugs of hot chocolate and glasses of soda, wine, and beer, when one of the bartenders motioned him aside.

"Uh, I don't know if this is such a good idea, Mr. H." He pointed at the ragtag group of artists, who had discovered a swing version of "Rock This Town" on the jukebox and were now dancing around the pool table on the raised platform at the opposite end of the room. "The other customers might not like it very much."

Gary watched Luke, the new self-appointed Poet Laureate of McGinty's, lift Bernardo onto the pool table; Jeff spun Lucy off her feet. "Well, the other customers don't have to dance if they don't want to."

"Miss Clark?" The bartender turned his plea to Marissa.

She listened for a moment to the bouncy music, to the animated voices, and to Bernardo's hysterical giggles rising over all of it. "They stay," she said firmly, her tone leaving no room for argument. Defeated, the bartender went back to his station. "The place hasn't been this lively since Patrick left," Marissa added.

"Hey, Miss Clark." Gary nudged her with his elbow. "You wanna dance?" Marissa chuckled at his attempt to imitate their employee's whiny tone, then nodded, and they threaded their way through groups of slightly bemused sports fans, who could only watch, not hear, the college basketball game on the television.

It wasn't long before the dance had descended into happy chaos; they twirled and stumbled into each other, bumped into tables, mashed toes--and no one seemed to mind at all. Finally, out of breath, Gary leaned back against the pool table, pulling his partner out of harm's way as Jeff went flailing by, eyes closed, arms waving like a belly dancer. "You sure know how to show a girl a good time," Marissa laughed. "I had no idea you knew how to jitterbug."

"I don't. It's just a good thing you wore heavy shoes today."

Luke spun Lucy around once more, and deposited her on the pool table behind Gary. Dizzy and gasping for breath, she grabbed Gary's shoulder, then pointed to the corner. "Oh no!"

"What is it?" asked Marissa.

Gary shook his head. "You're not gonna believe this."

Cat had wandered over to investigate the mayhem, and Bernardo, ever the animal lover, had scooped it up. Now holding it under the front paws, the little boy jigged around the impromptu dance floor, swinging the cat from side to side in time to the music.

"Nardo--" Lucy began, but Gary shook his head.

"It's okay," he said with a grin. After three and a half years, he could read those green eyes from across the room. "I don't think Cat minds at all."

In fact, Cat was still putting up with it a little while later when Inez, Maria, and Luis walked into bar. "Mama!" Lucy called happily, waving her nearly-empty glass of soda from her perch on the pool table, then jumping down to drag her family to the party. There was a bit of relief, Gary thought, on Inez's face, as if she hadn't been quite sure her children wouldn't disappear on her again.

Marissa had been right about Maria. She convulsed with laughter, black curls bobbing madly, when she saw Bernardo dancing with Cat. It wasn't long before Lucy was introducing her mother and aunt to everyone there. Gary was clearing empty glasses from the pool table and describing the scene to Marissa when Luis Savaria approached him.

"Mr. Hobson--"

"I told you yesterday, it's Gary."

Luis broke into a grin that was a lot like Bernardo's, a beam of light in a roundish face, and Gary wondered if maybe this was why the kids had trusted him immediately--resemblance to the father they'd loved so much. "Gary, then." He held out his hand. "I just wanted to thank you again. Now that I know the whole story--after all those months, to have them so close and in so much trouble...It's going to take a while for them to deal with it all, but at least they'll get the chance, and I--" His smile had faded, but his eyes were warm when he shook Gary's hand and then Marissa's, his grip strong and firm. "If you hadn't been in that park two nights ago, I wouldn't have a family here tonight."

Gary wasn't used to being thanked, not this directly, and it made him more than a little uncomfortable. "Well, uh, we were--" Marissa's fingers brushed his, and she mouthed the end of the next sentence along with him. "We were just in the right place at the right time."

"No. You were the right _people_ in the right place at the right time. That makes all the difference." Luis waited until Gary acknowledged this with a nod, the only response he really felt capable of making. He leaned back against the railing that separated the pool area from the rest of the bar, and the three stood and watched and listened to the group that had now settled around a dining table, downing french fries with the same gusto they'd given the dance. Lucy was too busy talking to her mother and her aunt to notice that Bernardo was stealing most of her food.

"She's going to start back to school next week, right?" Gary asked Luis.

The other man looked perplexed, and perhaps a little offended. "Lucy? Of course she'll go to school."

"No, it's just that--that was all she wanted. Find her mother and go to school. She's a special kid." Maybe it wasn't Gary's place to say this, but he had to. He turned so that he was looking Luis right in the eye. "Make sure she has a chance to--to--" It wasn't easy to say everything he wanted for a kid like Lucy, especially if...but he couldn't explain about the paper, not now anyway. "Just make sure she has a chance."

The smile turned back on in Luis's eyes, and he nodded firmly. "You got it."

The group of young artists had apparently settled in for the night, and showed no signs of leaving, but the Savarias got ready to go right after dinner. Jeff spun Lucy around one more time when she said good-bye, then Gary and Marissa walked the family to the front door.

Gary was hard-pressed to deal with the tidal wave of gratitude directed at him. Luis shook his hand again; Maria, her eyes dancing, patted his arm and called him "Our Hero". Inez kissed both his cheeks and squeezed him almost as tight as she'd been holding her kids all evening. Bernardo, who'd been dozing in his mother's lap, stood limp and unprotesting as Marissa zipped him into his new coat. But he blinked awake and wrapped his arms around her neck when she hugged him, and then trotted over to shake Gary's hand, just as his uncle had done. His solemn, owlish expression had the other adults hiding smiles behind their hands, but Gary managed to keep a straight face.

"You come back again," Gary told him seriously. "We need some more drawings for the office."

"Gato?"

"Yeah, a portrait of the cat," he said dryly. "That would be just about right."

But the miracle was Lucy, the same girl who'd cringed and run away from him only three nights ago. She stood a bit away from the rest of them, watching the group that she'd help bring together with quiet satisfaction, but when Gary started fumbling for the right words to say to her, she walked right up to him and let her arms do the talking. She wrapped them tight around his waist, so tight it took his breath away. "Gracias," she whispered.

Even as he hugged her back, Gary was wondering if that thanks was a bit premature. If she got involved with the paper, who knew what could happen to her? No matter what Marissa said, he would feel responsible.

But maybe Marissa was right; maybe this was a choice that was out of his hands. She'd certainly been right about one other thing. Whether he'd asked for the paper or not, it hadn't turned out so badly after all. Maybe what he most needed to do for Lucy was to make sure she knew she could handle whatever came her way, and that she wasn't alone.

"You're a good kid," he told Lucy quietly. She pulled back, and he put both hands on her shoulders, smiling as he looked her right in her dark, questioning eyes. "You're a really good kid."

FINIS

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Notes: The story Lucy reads is _The Deliverers of Their Country_ , by Edith Nesbit. There's a wonderful edition illustrated with watercolors by Lisbeth Zwerger, published by the Picture Book Studio in 1985.
> 
> Jeff, Luke, Rob, Trini, and co. were of course inspired by my late-90s obsession with _Rent_ , and a few of their lines are quotes from the musical. The Maria and Luis in my head look an awful lot like the _Sesame Street_ characters, because after all they'd been through I wanted Lucy and Bernardo to land somewhere safe and comforting.


End file.
